Detailed Placement
The detailed placement module in OpenROAD (dpl) is based on OpenDP, or
Open-Source Detailed Placement Engine. Its key features are:
- Fence region.
- Fragmented ROWs.
Commands
- Parameters in square brackets `[-param param]` are optional.
- Parameters without square brackets `-param2 param2` are required.
Detailed Placement
The detailed_placement command performs detailed placement of instances
to legal locations after global placement.
detailed_placement
[-max_displacement disp|{disp_x disp_y}]
[-disallow_one_site_gaps]
[-report_file_name filename]
Options
| Switch Name | Description |
|---|---|
-max_displacement |
Max distance that an instance can be moved (in microns) when finding a site where it can be placed. Either set one value for both directions or set {disp_x disp_y} for individual directions. The default values are {0, 0}, and the allowed values within are integers [0, MAX_INT]. |
-disallow_one_site_gaps |
Disable one site gap during placement check. |
-report_file_name |
File name for saving the report to (e.g. report.json.) |
Set Placement Padding
The set_placement_padding command sets left and right padding in multiples
of the row site width. Use the set_placement_padding command before
legalizing placement to leave room for routing. Use the -global flag
for padding that applies to all instances. Use -instances
for instance-specific padding. The instances insts can be a list of instance
names, or an instance object returned by the SDC get_cells command. To
specify padding for all instances of a common master, use the -filter
"ref_name == " option to get_cells.
set_placement_padding
-global|-masters masters|-instances insts
[-right site_count]
[-left site_count]
Options
Either one of these flags must be set: `-global | -masters | -instances`.
The order of preference is `global > masters > instances`
| Switch Name | Description |
|---|---|
-global |
Set padding globally using left and right values. |
-masters |
Set padding only for these masters using left and right values. |
-instances |
For -instances, you will set padding only for these insts using left and right values. |
-left |
Left padding (in site count). |
-right |
Right padding (in site count). |
instances |
Set padding for these list of instances. Not to be confused with the -instances switch above. |
Filler Placement
The filler_placement command fills gaps between detail-placed instances
to connect the power and ground rails in the rows. filler_masters is a
list of master/macro names to use for filling the gaps. Wildcard matching
is supported, so FILL* will match, e.g., FILLCELL_X1 FILLCELL_X16 FILLCELL_X2 FILLCELL_X32 FILLCELL_X4 FILLCELL_X8. To specify a different naming prefix
from FILLER_ use -prefix <new prefix>.
filler_placement
[-prefix prefix]
filler_masters
Options
| Switch Name | Description |
|---|---|
-prefix |
Prefix to name the filler cells. The default value is FILLER_. |
filler_masters |
Filler master cells. |
Remove Fillers
This command removes all filler cells.
remove_fillers
Check Placement
The check_placement command checks the placement legality. It returns
0 if the placement is legal.
check_placement
[-verbose]
[-disallow_one_site_gaps]
[-report_file_name filename]
Options
| Switch Name | Description |
|---|---|
-verbose |
Enable verbose logging. |
-disallow_one_site_gaps |
Disable one site gap during placement check. |
-report_file_name |
File name for saving the report to (e.g. report.json. |
Optimize Mirroring
The optimize_mirroring command mirrors instances about the Y axis in
a weak attempt to reduce the total half-perimeter wirelength (HPWL).
optimize_mirroring
Useful Developer Commands
If you are a developer, you might find these useful. More details can be found in the source file or the swig file.
| Command Name | Description |
|---|---|
detailed_placement_debug |
Debug detailed placement. |
get_masters_arg |
Get masters from a design. |
get_inst_bbox |
Get bounding box of an instance. |
get_inst_grid_bbox |
Get grid bounding box of an instance. |
format_grid |
Format grid (takes in length x and site width w as inputs). |
get_row_site |
Get row site name. |
Example scripts
Examples scripts demonstrating how to run dpl on a sample design of aes as follows:
./test/aes.tcl
Regression tests
There are a set of regression tests in ./test. Refer to this section for more information.
Simply run the following script:
./test/regression
Limitations
FAQs
Check out GitHub discussion about this tool.
Authors
- SangGi Do and Mingyu Woo (respective Ph. D. advisors: Seokhyeong Kang, Andrew B. Kahng).
- Rewrite and port to OpenDB/OpenROAD by James Cherry, Parallax Software
References
- Do, S., Woo, M., & Kang, S. (2019, May). Fence-region-aware mixed-height standard cell legalization. In Proceedings of the 2019 on Great Lakes Symposium on VLSI (pp. 259-262). (.pdf)
License
BSD 3-Clause License. See LICENSE file.