Patent ID: 7500214

Claim:
A method for preparing an I/O cell library based on a basic cell for designing an integrated circuit, comprising: designing a basic cell based on a predetermined basic design requirement, the basic cell having one or more components needed for designing one or more I/O cells; extracting all programmable connection points available on the basic cell on which connections can be made or removed on an as-needed basis to include or exclude one or more components; and identifying one or more sets of programmable feature connection points from the extracted programmable connection points based on one or more I/O cell features, the programmable connection points and feature connection points to be connected by a via layer having vias for connecting a first pattern on a first layer having a portion of the basic cell to a second pattern on a second layer; wherein the I/O cell library helps to dynamically generate a desired I/O cell based on a predetermined configuration requirement.