Internals: Refactor AstNodeBlock representation (#6280)
AstNodeBlock now has 2 child lists: 'declsp' to hold declarations within
the block, and 'stmtsp' to hold the procedural statements.
AstBegin is then just a simple subtype of AstNodeBlock.
AstFork is a proper superset of AstNodeBlock (and also AstBegin), and
adds 'forksp' which hold the parallel statements. Having the sequential
'stmtsp' in AstFork is required to properly implement variable
initializers in fork blocks (IEEE 1800-2023 9.3.2), this makes that
clear, while also separating the non AstNodeStmt declarations
(for #6280). The actual fork branches in 'AstFork::forkps()' are all
AstBegin nodes. This is required as lowering stages will introduce
additional statements in each parallel branch. (We used to wrap AstFork
statements into AstBegin in 3 different places, now they always are
AstBegin and this is enforced via the type checker/V3Broken).
Also fixes incorrect disabling of forked processes from within the `fork`.
This patch implements #6480. All loop statements are represented using
AstLoop and AstLoopTest.
This necessitates rework of the loop unroller to handle loops of
arbitrary form. To enable this, I have split the old unroller used for
'generate for' statements and moved it into V3Param, and subsequently
rewrote V3Unroll to handle the new representation. V3Unroll can now
unroll more complex loops, including with loop conditions containing
multiple variable references or inlined functions.
Handling the more generic code also requires some restrictions. If a
loop contains any of the following, it cannot be unrolled:
- A timing control that might suspend the loop
- A non-inlined call to a non-pure function
These constructs can change the values of variables in the loop, so are
generally not safe to unroll if they are present. (We could still unroll
if all the variables needed for unrolling are automatic, however we
don't do that right now.)
These restrictions seem ok in the benchmark suite, where the new
unroller can generally unroll many more loops than before.
Internals: Refactor generate construct Ast handling (#6280)
We introduce AstNodeGen, the common base class of AstGenBlock,
AstGenCase, AstGenFor, and AstGenIf, which together represent all SV
generate constructs. Subsequently remove AstNodeFor, AstNodeCase
(AstCase is now directly derived from AstNodeStmt) and adjust internals
to work on the new representation.
Output is identical modulo hashes do to changed AstNode type ids, no
functional change intended.
Step towards #6280.
The only use for the clocker attribute and the AstVar::isUsedClock that
is actually necessary today for correctness is to mark top level inputs
of --lib-create blocks as being (or driving) a clock signal. Correctness
of --lib-create (and hence hierarchical blocks) actually used to depend
on having the right optimizations eliminate intermediate clocks (e.g.:
V3Gate), when the top level port was not used directly in a sensitivity
list, or marking top level signals manually via --clk or the clocker
attribute. However V3Sched::partition already needs to trace through the
logic to figure out what signals might drive a sensitivity list, so it
can very easily mark all top level inputs as such.
In this patch we remove the AstVar::attrClocker and AstVar::isUsedClock
attributes, and replace them with AstVar::isPrimaryClock, automatically
set by V3Sched::partition. This eliminates all need for manual
annotation so we are deprecating the --clk/--no-clk options and the
clocker/no_clocker attributes.
This also eliminates the opportunity for any further mis-optimization
similar to #6453.
Regarding the other uses of the removed AstVar attributes:
- As of 5.000, initial edges are triggered via a separate mechanism
applied in V3Sched, so the use in V3EmitCFunc.cpp is redundant
- Also as of 5.000, we can handle arbitrary sensitivity expressions, so
the restriction on eliminating clock signals in V3Gate is unnecessary
- Since the recent change when Dfg is applied after V3Scope, it does
perform the equivalent of GateClkDecomp, so we can delete that pass.
These are no longer required for correct scheduling. They are still
accepted for backward compatibility, but have no effect on simulation
and are dropped in the front-end. Also removed the then redundant
AstAlwaysPublic class.
Fixes#6442
Geza Lore
Wilson Snyder
Igor Zaworski
Nick Brereton
Andrew Nolte
github action
Zhou Shen
Drew Ranck