PBO-Based Test Compression

This paper presents a novel ATPG and test compression algorithm based on Pseudo-Boolean (PBO) optimization. Similarly to SAT-based ATPGs, the test for each fault is represented implicitly as a PBO instance. The optimization process solves the problem of maximizing the number of unspecified values in the test. A novel don´t care aware circuit-to-PBO conversion procedure is presented. The obtained unspecified values in the test are efficiently exploited in test compression. The produced compressed test sequence is suited for the RESPIN decompression architecture, thus for testing systems on-chip. The presented experimental results show the efficiency and competitiveness of the proposed method.