Patent ID: 7689400

Claim:
A computer-implemented method executing on one or more processors of a computer system for accessing an alias from an alias file, the method comprising: generating by an alias file generator an alias file for the simulation model containing locations for the equivalent nets that were optimized out of a flattened simulation model; generating by an alias index file generator an alias index file for the generated alias file, the alias index file having a plurality of entries having a net name, a record length, and an associated position in the alias file for each net name in the generated alias file; searching by a simulator a simulation model for a particular net name; in response to failing to find the particular net name in the model, automatically searching by an alias index access system an alias cache for the particular net name to attempt to determine an alias for the particular net name; in response to failing to find the particular net name in the alias cache, automatically searching by the alias index access system the generated alias index file for an alias index entry associated with the net name; in the event the net name entry is found, accessing by the alias index access system from an alias file an alias associated with the net name; and fetching by the alias index access system the alias associated with the net name from the alias file.