High-level synthesis using genetic algorithm

This paper reports on a genetic algorithm applied to high-level hardware synthesis. The GA generates a register transfer level circuit from a behavioral specification of a hardware system. High-level synthesis is an NP complete and multiple objective problem. This paper describes two methods which were applied to the problem: the first divides high-level synthesis into scheduling and allocation problems and the second treats high-level synthesis as a resource assignment task without dividing it. Both these methods succeed in obtaining optimal solutions. In particularly, it is shown that the latter method is general enough to be applied to a class of problems minimizing several objectives such as high-level synthesis