Automating post-silicon debugging and repair

Modern IC designs have reached unparalleled levels of complexity, resulting in more and more bugs discovered after design tape-out However, so far only very few EDA tools for post-silicon debugging have been reported in the literature. In this work we develop a methodology and new algorithms to automate this debugging process. Key innovations in our technique include support for the physical constraints specific to post-silicon debugging and the ability to repair functional errors through subtle modifications of an existing layout. In addition, our proposed post-silicon debugging methodology (FogClear) can repair some electrical errors while preserving functional correctness. Thus, by automating this traditionally manual debugging process, our contributions promise to reduce engineers´ debugging effort. As our empirical results show, we can automatically repair more than 70% of our benchmark designs.