AutoReloc: Automated Design Flow for Bitstream Relocation on Xilinx FPGAs

Dynamic and partial reconfiguration of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) enable to reuse logic resources for several applications which are scheduled in a sequential order or which are loaded on demand. A fraction of the design on the FPGA is then substituted by another logic function while the rest of the system on the chip stays unaffected. If a design provides several partial reconfigurable areas, the configuration bitstream representing the logic function to be configured in this region has to be adapted to the physical requirements of this chip area. This can be achieved by deploying a repository with all possible configuration bitstreams for all possible regions. It is obvious that storage space can quickly become a limiting parameter in reconfigurable designs. For this purpose, bitstream relocation provides a less storage greedy approach. Only one representation as bitstream of an application needs to be stored. During the configuration process, a relocation algorithm manipulates the bitstream in order to suit it to the respective reconfigurable area. However, reconfigurable regions have to fulfill strong constraints for a relocation to be possible, which makes the selection and placement of reconfigurable regions a complex process. Unfortunately this is not automated by tools so far. In this paper, an approach to automate the development of such relocatable bitstreams is presented along with new algorithms related to relocation specific steps. This approach results in functional designs with minimal intervention from the designer.