Fast prototyping environment for embedded reconfigurable units

In order to cope with the increasing complexity of embedded applications as well as their fast evolution, flexible systems with high-performance are mandatory. In this context, reconfigurable system-on-chip solutions that meet application needs have become common. However, the innovation race shrinks time-to-market and puts high pressure on designers. Therefore designers need appropriate methodologies and tools to efficiently perform design space exploration of reconfigurable units. This paper addresses this issue with an ADL-based toolsuite for fast prototyping of reconfigurable units. Starting from a high-level model it supports design space exploration for different architectural solutions, to produce an hardware prototype and to generate the applicative tools for exploitation. Benefits and feasability of the approach are demonstrated by the complete prototyping and implementation of a reconfigurable unit supporting ressources virtualization.