In this report we discuss a set of techniques needed to generate and synthesize communication interfaces in a System Design context. Given a behavioral specification, we present the transformations necessary for generating a communication model containing channels and protocol. This work is being conducted in conjunction with codesign tools being developed in the CADLAB at the University of California, Irvine.

In this report we discuss the specification of an ATM cell filter. A behavioral model of the filter is supplied using two specification languages, VHDL, and SpecC, a new language under development by the CADLAB at the University of California, Irvine. A description of the functionality of the filter model is supplied in addition to language features and problems encountered during the specification process. This model to be used as an example for the evaluation of the SpecGen system, a simulation and synthesis environment also under development at the CADLAB.

In this report, we describe the specify-explore-refine (SER) co-design methodology for design of embedded systems. We describe the necessary design steps in order to map an abstract specification of the system to the final implementation model. We propose a co-design tool based on our co-design methodology. We also present a graphical user interface for the proposed co-design tool.