An Interactive Computer Graphics Language for the Design and Simulation of Digital Systems

Many computer hardware description languages have been introduced to describe and model digital networks at the register transfer level.^1-3Most CHDL\´s, however, like common programming languages, are "text oriented" and employ textual statements in the specification of a digital system. The process of converting a word statement problem into a description written in a design language is often tedious, especially when the design is complex. Many designers overcome this difficulty by "drawing" register layouts and control sequence or state diagrams for a design before hand-translating them into a specification in an appropriate design language. With the reduction in the costs of on-line computing and graphic terminals, this approach can be used early in the computer-aided-design cycle. This has in fact been accomplished at the University of Missouri-Rolla, where a graphic language called FLOWWARE has been developed to allow digital networks to be specified pictorially.