Traditional procedural computing systems consist
of processor hardware and software running on it. Programming means
downloading machine code into the RAM memory of
the processor. Machine code is generated by compilers accepting high level
programming languages. The RAM is the basis of the extreme flexibility of
procedural processors: the secret of success of
the software industry is RAM-based.
Morphware (Soft "Hardware)
Reconfigurable "hardware" is not really hard like
classical hardware. It can be re-configured by structural code (configuration
code) to be downloaded into the "hidden" RAM of
such Morphware. Such structural code is fundamentally different from (classical)
Software. Programming such reconfigurable platforms needs
Configware instead. For terminology see table
no. 1, and
more details.
Table no. 1: toward a
consensus on basic terminology:
Acronyms: r = reconfigurable | FP
= field-programmable | GA = gate array |
DPU = DataPath Unit | DPA = DPU array |
Configware versus Software
Configware versus Software means Procedural
Programming versus Structural Programming. Procedural programming of classical
processor hardware by Software means
Programming in Time.
I. e. a procedural program is a schedule. Structural programming by Configware,
however, means
Programming in Space. That's
why Configware versus Software means
Computing in Space versus Computing in Time.
Morphware Benefit
Computing in space allows massive parallelism, so that Morphware may be by orders
of magnitude more powerful than computing on classical processors, i. e. by
computing in time. Compared to specialized hardwired ASIC hardware, morphware
usage is highly flexible by reconfigurability.
This also means a fundamental change of the business model: special ASIC
hardware functionality is determined at vendor's site, whereas Morphware
functionality can be defined and even upgraded later at the customer's site.
This provides shorter time to market, as well as product longevity.
Configware Industry Success Story
Currently a
Configware Industry
is emerging as a counterpart to Software Industry. (Because this new
Industry is spinning off EDA industry, some people say "soft IP cores" instead
of Configware). The application of both is RAM-based: that of
Software and of Configware. Being RAM-based,
Configware is heading toward a success story
being similar as known from Software Industry.
