Patent Document

FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
   The present invention generally relates to integrated circuits (ICs), and more particularly to ICs that include non-volatile memory. 
   BACKGROUND 
   A programmable logic device (PLD) that includes non-volatile memory may retain data without power. The data retained in the non-volatile memory may be used for various purposes. A portion of the retained data may be configuration data used to program the logic and routing resources of the PLD to perform a specific function. In addition, a portion of the retained data may be accessible by the programmed device. The retained data may also include operating state of the configured function preserved during power-down of the PLD. 
   Generally a specific protocol is required to be implemented in the configured function to gain access to the retained data in the non-volatile memory. Reformatting of the retained data may further be required to enable application reading and writing of the retained data. A developer of an application for a PLD may devote significant effort in implementing the specific protocol and the data reformatting in the configured function. That effort may discourage development of applications using retained data from a non-volatile memory included in the PLD. 
   The present invention may address one or more of the above issues. 
   SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
   The various embodiments of the invention provide an integrated circuit (IC), which can in one embodiment be a programmable logic device (PLD), that includes volatile memories, at least one non-volatile memory, at least one control circuit, and a configurable logic array. Each volatile memory has an associated interface including a respective first input and a respective second input. The control circuit is coupled to the volatile memories and the non-volatile memory. The control circuit stores respective contents from each volatile memory in the non-volatile memory responsive to the respective first input, and loads the respective contents into each volatile memory from the non-volatile memory responsive to the respective second input. The configurable logic array is coupled to the volatile memories and is configurable to control each first input and each second input. The configurable logic array includes configurable logic resources and configurable routing resources. 
   It will be appreciated that various other embodiments are set forth in the Detailed Description and Claims which follow. 

   
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     Various aspects and advantages of the invention will become apparent upon review of the following detailed description and upon reference to the drawings in which: 
       FIG. 1  is a block diagram of a PLD including memories coupled to non-volatile memories, according to various embodiments of the invention; 
       FIG. 2  is a block diagram of a PLD including memories coupled to a non-volatile memory, according to various embodiments of the invention; 
       FIG. 3  is a block diagram of an example with application logic interfacing to a memory supporting update to a non-volatile memory and reload from the non-volatile memory, according to various embodiments of the invention; and 
       FIG. 4  is a flow diagram of a process for updating a non-volatile memory with the contents from a memory and later reloading the contents from the non-volatile memory to the memory. 
   

   DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
   In various embodiments of the invention, a PLD is programmed to perform an application function and the PLD includes non-volatile memory that may be used to retain data for the application function despite the interruption of power delivery to the PLD. The application data to be retained is stored by the application function in a memory, which is generally a volatile memory, and the application function generates an update control that causes the application data to be transferred from the volatile memory and stored in the non-volatile memory. Subsequently, for example, following interruption of power to the PLD, the application function generates a reload control that causes the application data previously stored to be transferred from the non-volatile memory and restored in the volatile memory. Then the application function may again access the application data in the volatile memory. 
   The non-volatile memory may also contain configuration data used to program the PLD to perform the application function. On restoring power delivery to the PLD following an interruption of power delivery to the PLD, a reset of the PLD may automatically program the PLD with the configuration data from the non-volatile memory to restore the application function. 
   The retention of application data may be accomplished using the volatile memory interface, which is likely already known to a developer of the application function, augmented with the inputs of the update control and the reload control. 
     FIG. 1  is a block diagram of a PLD  102  including memories  104 ,  106 ,  108 ,  110 ,  112 , and  114  coupled to non-volatile memories  116 ,  118 , and  120 , according to various embodiments of the invention. The PLD  102  may also include configurable input/output blocks  122 , configurable logic blocks  124 , configurable routing matrices  126 , and memory control blocks  128 . 
   Each memory  104  through  114  may be static random access memory (SRAM) that is distributed across a portion of the PLD  102  or that is localized to a contiguous block in the PLD  102 . The memories  104  through  114  are generally volatile memories that do not retain data when power delivery to the PLD  102  is interrupted. On commencing power delivery to the PLD  102 , the contents of memories  104  through  114  may be cleared by the PLD  102 . 
   Each non-volatile memory  116 ,  118 , and  120  may be, for example, erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM) including flash EPROM. Non-volatile memories  116 ,  118 , and  120  generally retain data when power delivery to PLD  102  is interrupted. 
   While power is supplied to PLD  102 , the contents of one or more of memories  104  through  114  may be transferred to non-volatile memories  116  through  120  via the control blocks  128 . Each memory  104  through  114  may be coupled to a non-volatile memory of non-volatile memories  116 ,  118 , and  120 . For example, memories  104  and  106  may be coupled to non-volatile memory  116 , memories  108  and  110  may be coupled to non-volatile memory  118 , and memories  112  and  114  may be coupled to non-volatile memory  120 . During power delivery to PLD  102 , memory data  130  and  132  for non-volatile memory  116 , memory data  134  and  136  for non-volatile memory  118 , and memory data  138  and  140  for non-volatile memory  120  may each be updated from memory  104 ,  106 ,  108 ,  110 ,  112 , and  114 , respectively. During power delivery to PLD  102 , memories  104 ,  106 ,  108 ,  110 ,  112 , and  114  may be reloaded with memory data  130 ,  132 ,  134 ,  136 ,  138 , and  140 , respectively. 
   If power delivery to PLD  102  is interrupted after updating memory data  130  through  140  from memories  104  through  114 , memories  104  through  114  generally do not retain data while non-volatile memories  116  through  120  do retain memory data  130  through  140 . Subsequent to restoring power delivery to PLD  102 , the prior contents of memories  104  through  114  may be restored from memory data  130  through  140 , respectively. 
     FIG. 2  is a block diagram of a PLD  202  including memories  204  coupled to a non-volatile memory  206 , according to various embodiments of the invention. The PLD  202  may also include configurable input/output blocks (IOB)  122 , configurable logic blocks (CLB)  124 , configurable routing matrices (RM)  126 , and memory control blocks  208 . 
   The configurable blocks  122 ,  124 , and  126  of PLD  202  may be programmed to implement the logic for an application function. Memories  204  may provide data storage for the application function. The application function may access the storage of memories  204  from certain configurable blocks  124  and  126  with a control bus on line  210 , an address bus on line  212 , and a data bus on line  214 . 
   Control blocks  208  may transfer data between the memories  204  and the non-volatile memory  206 . It will be appreciated that there may be only one control block coupled to each of the memories  204  or more than two control blocks. The control blocks  208  may have respective inputs of update signals on lines  216  and reload signals on lines  218  for each memory  204 . The update and reload input signals on lines  216  and  218  may be controlled by certain configurable blocks  124  and  126 . An asserted update signal on line  216  for a control block  208  may cause the control block  208  to update a corresponding memory data  220  in non-volatile memory  206  with the current contents of the corresponding memory  204 . An asserted reload signal on line  218  for a control block  208  may cause the control block  208  to transfer a corresponding memory data  220  to the corresponding memory  204 . 
   An application needing to preserve data may store the data in a memory  204  by writing the data to the memory  204  using lines  210 ,  212 , and  214 , and subsequently transfer the data to the non-volatile memory  206  by asserting the appropriate update signal on line  216 . The application may transfer data to non-volatile memory  206  for various purposes, for example, to preserve the data through an expected interruption of power delivery to PLD  202 , to repeatedly save data that needs to be preserved through a possible unexpected interruption of power delivery to PLD  202 , or to use non-volatile memory  206  to extend the storage capacity of PLD  202 . The application may transfer the data from the non-volatile memory  206  to the memory  204  by asserting the appropriate reload signal on line  218 , and then read the data from the memory  204  using lines  210 ,  212 , and  214 . The application may transfer the data from the non-volatile memory  206  to obtain access to the data, for example, to obtain access to the data after restoration of power delivery to PLD  202 . 
   The PLD  202  may also include a configuration port  222  that may permit an external device to read and write the contents of non-volatile memory  206 . Typically, the contents of non-volatile memory  206  are written once from an external source via the configuration port  222  during programming of PLD  202  for the manufacture of a system. However, the contents of non-volatile memory may be rewritten, possibly repeatedly, via the configuration port  222  during development of the application function or to fix discovered defects in the manufactured system. In one embodiment, the configuration port  222  includes the function of the control blocks  208 . 
   The non-volatile memory  206  may contain memory data  220  for each memory  204  and configuration data including IOB configuration data  224 , CLB configuration data  226 , RM configuration data  228 , and memory configuration data  230 . The application logic of an application function may be specified by the configuration data  224 ,  226 ,  228 , and  230 . A reset of PLD  202 , such as may occur during power-up of PLD  202 , may initialize PLD  202  to perform the application function by automatically transferring the configuration data  224 ,  226 ,  228 , and  230  from the non-volatile memory  206  to configuration registers or configuration SRAM associated respectively with the IOB  122 , CLB  124 , RM  126 , and memories  204 . 
   The values of the configuration registers or configuration SRAM associated with each block  122 ,  124 ,  126 , and  204  may determine the function of the block. Thus, on reset of the PLD  202 , the application function may be automatically restored and the application may also restore to the memories  204  the memory data  220  that was previously saved by the application. In one embodiment, memories  204  are automatically initialized with memory data  220  on reset of PLD  202 , and this memory data  220  may be either data previously saved by the application or data written to non-volatile memory  206  via configuration port  222  during programming of PLD  202 . 
   The memory configuration data  230  may configure the operation of each memory  204 . For example, each memory  204  may be configurable to provide either synchronous or asynchronous interfaces on lines  210 ,  212 , and  214 , and to adjust the width and depth of the memory  204 . The memory configuration data  230  configures the operation of each memory  204  while the memory data  220  may provide a value for each bit of the contents of each memory  204 . The memory configuration data  230 , including the width and depth adjustment, permits the memory data  220  to be reformatted to match the requirements of the application function. 
   The memories  204 , the configurable logic of configurable blocks  122 ,  124 , and  126 , and other blocks of PLD  202  may be arranged in PLD  202  as an array of blocks, such that the configurable blocks  122 ,  124 , and  126  are arranged as a configurable logic array. 
   In one embodiment, the non-volatile memory  206  is partitioned into sectors with a sector for each memory data  220  and one or more sectors for the configuration data  224 ,  226 ,  228 , and  230 . Typically, there are multiple sectors for the configuration data  224 ,  226 ,  228 , and  230 , with each sector containing a portion of the IOB configuration data  224 , the CLB configuration data  226 , the RM configuration data  228 , and the memory configuration data  230 . 
     FIG. 3  is a block diagram  300  of an example with application logic  302  interfacing to a memory  304  supporting update to a non-volatile memory and reload from the non-volatile memory, according to various embodiments of the invention. The block diagram  300  does not show the structure of the PLD  306 , but instead shows the structure of the application function  308  that PLD  306  is configured to perform by programming PLD  306  with configuration data corresponding to the application function  308 . 
   The application function  308  in a PLD  306  includes the application logic  302  and a black box representation of the memory  304 . The black box representation of the memory  304  presents an abstraction of the memory  304 . In certain PLD-application development environments, a black box such as memory black box  304  may be required to be located at the top level of a hierarchy for the application function  308 . The memory black box  304  may have parameters to specify configurable features of the memory, such as synchronous or asynchronous interfaces and the width and depth of the memory  304 . The black box representation of the memory  304  may represent a single memory block, such as Xilinx block RAM, or multiple memory blocks, such as memory blocks  104  through  114  of  FIG. 1 , or memories included in a number of configurable logic blocks  122 ,  124 , and  126  of  FIG. 2  distributed across PLD  202 . 
   The memory black box  304  may have a control input of write enable on line  314 . When write enable on line  314  is asserted, the memory black box  304  may be written at the address on line  316  with the value of data-in bus on line  318 . The data-out bus on line  320  may provide the value from memory black box  304  at the address on line  316 , regardless of the value of write enable on line  314 . It will be appreciated that the memory black box  304  may have alternate configurations including a clock input for a synchronous interface and multiple access ports. 
   Various embodiments of the invention may add the control inputs of the update signal on line  322  and the reload signal on line  324  to the interface of memory black box  304 . When the application logic  302  asserts the update signal on line  322 , the current contents of the memory black box  304  are saved in a non-volatile memory. When the application logic  302  asserts the reload signal on line  324 , the contents of memory black box  304  are overwritten with retained data from the non-volatile memory. The retained data used to overwrite the contents of memory black box  304  when the application logic  302  asserts the reload signal on line  324  may be either the prior contents of the memory black box  304  at a prior assertion of the update signal on line  322  by the application logic  302 , or the original contents of the non-volatile memory if the application logic  302  did not previously assert the update signal on line  322 . 
   Application logic  302  may retain the data in memory black box  304  through an interruption of power delivery to PLD  306  by asserting update on line  322  before the interruption of power delivery and asserting reload on line  324  after the interruption of power delivery. 
     FIG. 4  is a flow diagram of a process for updating a non-volatile memory with the contents from a memory and later reloading the contents from the non-volatile memory to the memory. 
   At step  402 , a PLD is programmed to perform an application function that generates update and corresponding reload signals in response to application-specific operating conditions. Each update signal and corresponding reload signal is associated with one of the volatile memories in the PLD that implements the volatile storage. Each update signal controls storing the contents of the associated volatile storage in non-volatile storage, with the non-volatile storage including one or more non-volatile memories. Each corresponding reload signal controls restoring the contents of the associated volatile storage from the non-volatile storage. 
   At step  404 , for each asserted update signal the contents of the associated volatile storage is saved in the non-volatile storage. At step  406 , for each asserted reload signal the contents of the associated volatile storage is restored from the non-volatile storage. 
   The present invention is thought to be applicable to a variety of systems for moving data between volatile and non-volatile memories in PLDs. Other aspects and embodiments of the present invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein. It is intended that the specification and illustrated embodiments be considered as examples only, with a true scope and spirit of the invention being indicated by the following claims.

Technology Category: 5