Overview documentation for loadable targets.

t-dll.txt

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+
+LOADABLE TARGETS
+
+Icarus Verilog supports dynamically loading code generator modules to
+perform the back-end processing of the completed design. The user
+specifies on the command line the module to load. The compiler loads
+the module (once the design is compiled and elaborated) and calls it
+to finally handle the design.
+
+Loadable target modules implement a set of functions that the core
+compiler calls to pass the design to it, and the module in turn uses a
+collection of functions in the core (the API) to access details of the
+design.
+
+LOADING TARGET MODULES
+
+The target module loader is invoked with the ivl flag "-tdll". That
+is, the DLL loader is a linked in target type. The name of the target
+module to load is then specified with the DLL flag, i.e. "-fDLL=<path>".
+
+
+LOADABLE TARGET MODULE API
+
+The target module API is defined in the ivl_target.h header file. This
+declares all the type and functions that a loadable module needs to
+access the design.
+
+
+PROCESSES
+
+A process is an always or initial construct with its associated
+statement. The target gets from the compiler an ivl_process_t object,
+that holds the process type (always or initial) and the statement,
+which is an ivl_statement_t.
+
+All the interesting stuff happens in the ivl_statement_t object. This
+is a generic object that represents any single Verilog statement. If
+the statement is compound, then it also holds references to the
+contained statements. The target module can access statements in any
+way it chooses, once it is handed the process that contains the
+statement.
+
+
+EXPRESSIONS
+
+In behavioral code (and some combinational code) expressions are
+passed on to the target as ivl_expr_t objects. Each object is a node
+in a tree that represents the expression from the source. All the
+issues of width and sign are taken care of so that it is clear an easy
+to know exactly what you have.
+
+All expressions have a width, available with the ivl_expr_width()
+function. Each node in an expression tree may have a different width,
+the compiler figures out everything and eliminates the ambiguity.
+
+All expressions are also "signed" or "unsigned" -- mostly
+unsigned. The ivl_expr_signed() function returns true if the
+expression node is signed. A node may be signed, for example, if it is
+a reference to an integer or a signed wire. The compiler figures out
+whether or not each node is signed, the target need not guess.
+