Interconnection network simulator (INS)

The increasing speed of today's digital systems has imposed new demands on interconnection network design. To help ensure quality designs, a way was needed to assess the performance of the interconnection network early in the design process. However, existing design systems did not support transmission line and circuit analyses. Now, the interconnection network simulator (INS) — an interactive, menu-driven simulation program — provides this capability. The INS allows a circuit designer to simulate the entire interconnection network under active conditions and provides graphs of the voltage, current, and frequency responses for evaluating the network's performance. Its on-line editing feature permits the designer to alter the electrical, geometrical, and physical parameters of the simulated network to increase its performance. The INS has been incorporated into several general computer-aided design systems, giving them the transmission line and circuit analysis capabilities that they lacked.