Non Disclosure Form

In order to get access to the design tools and technology information, all students must download, print and sign a MOSIS non-disclosure form; mail it (address on homepage) or leave it in my Mailbox in the EE office; without this form your computer account cannot be activated. Please respect this confidentiality agreement and keep the IC technology information (models, process information) strictly confidential.

VLSI Teaching Computer Lab access

To set up your computer account and to enable access to the VLSI Teaching Computing Lab (Mudd 1218) you need to send an email with: first name, last name, pid, uni, ssn, on-campus/off-campus at the beginning of the term. You can also contact the lab manager, John Kazana, 1312 Mudd Building, (212) 854-2427, [email protected]

Computer Problems

Strictly follow these Instructions and Policies for using the VLSI Teaching Lab (1218)/Embedded systems Lab (1235)

The following machines are available for (remote) login

ILAB Hosts (Mudd 1235): micro1.ilab.columbia.edu, micro2.ilab.columbia.edu, to ...., micro15.ilab.columbia.edu

CISL Hosts (Mudd 1218): thebes.cisl.columbia.edu, nemea.cisl.columbia.edu, odessa.cisl.columbia.edu, mykonos.cisl.columbia.edu, milos.cisl.columbia.edu, marathon.cisl.columbia.edu rhodes.cisl.columbia.edu, sparta.cisl.columbia.edu, aegina.cisl.columbia.edu, argos.cisl.columbia.edu, byzantium.cisl.columbia.edu, corinth.cisl.columbia.edu, cyrene.cisl.columbia.edu, laurium.cisl.columbia.edu, delphi.cisl.columbia.edu

Instructions for setting up a remote X11 connection to the VLSI Teaching machines

Remote students need the ability to remotely run the design tools on our VLSI/CISL Teaching machines in Mudd 12th floor. This involves setting up an ssh connection to the machines and running an Xserver on your system. Instructions are at http://www.ee.columbia.edu/systems/x11.html

Some information on setting up Exceed with SSH can be found here (local copy).

Make sure your are confident you have a sufficiently fast internet connection (broadband). Make sure you understand the use of ssh & X11 before you register for this course as a remote student.

We will not be able to help you setting up that connection since it is too specific to your particular computing setup and internet connection.

Some tips:

• In contrast to the instructions some other tips/tricks, you do not have to set the $DISPLAY variable manually. Use ssh for X11 forwarding and it will set the $DISPLAY variable automatically on the remote machine. Depending on your configuration, you might have to invoke your ssh with the -X option:
  • ssh -X [email protected]
  • (replace studentname with your account name; replace machine with the name of a machine (see above));
  after logging on, verify if $DISPLAY is set in your shell with
  • echo $DISPLAY
  run
  • xclock
  and make sure you get a clock on your computer; then, try
  • icfb
  to start cadence.
• If you are working remotely, it might make sense to do compression of the traffic with the -C option:
  • ssh -X -C [email protected]

Cadence tutorials

Cadence tutorials from Prof. Shepard's EE4321 class

Manuals: All the cadence manuals are (only) available in electronic version. You can get the manual by issuing the command 'cdsdoc' or by hitting Help in some of the tools. The section under Analog IC design is of interest for this class.

Remark 1: These tutorials are using the hspice simulator; we will be using the Spectre and SpectreRF simulator. Make sure you select that simulator in Analog Artist under Setup -> Simulator.

Remark 2: These tutorials are using the TSMC 0.25um technology; we will be using a version of the TSMC 0.18um technology for this class; you will need to load a different model file as outlined below.

Setting up the TSMC018 technology

You need to include the tsmc 0.18u library in your cds.lib if you don't see it when you run icfb for the first time. Add the following line to your cds.lib file:
INCLUDE /usr/tech/tsmc018/cdslib/tsmc018.lib
If you don't have a cds.lib file, put this one in your home directory and add the line in it.

Using the TSMC018_teaching.scs model file

Save the following model library file (spectre syntax) into your directory tree as TSMC018_teaching.scs and use it in Artist -> Set-up -> Models. This file only has a model for the regular 1.8V devices for a typical (section tt), slow (section ss), and fast (section ff) process corner.

This model file is based on data available on the internet at the MOSIS website (see file for details on how the model library was constructed). You can copy this model library to your own computer and use it to run simulations locally if you have a circuit simulator available.

Everyone should use this model library for their simulation assignments for this class! The following section is only for reference.

Using the files in /usr/tech/tsmc018

The files in /usr/tech/ cannot be copied due to non-disclosure restrictions! This applies to models, manuals, documentation or any other file in that directory tree.

Use the following model file in spectre for typical models:
/usr/tech/tsmc018/tsmc018/mm018.scs

Device	Model name	Section
1.8V pMOS, nMOS regular devices	nch, pch	tt
3.3V pMOS, nMOS regular devices	nch3, pch3	tt_3v
1.8V zero Vt nMOS	nanch	tt_na
3.3V zero Vt nMOS	nanch3	tt_3vna
1.8V medium Vt nMOS	mench	tt_m
3.3V medium Vt nMOS	mench3	tt_3m

Replace tt by ss for slow/slow or ff for fast/fast process corners.

Brief documentation about the technology design kit (preliminary)

Important References

• TSMC 0.18u Mixed Signal Design Guideline:
  /usr/tech/tsmc018/tsmc018/T018MMSP002_1_5.pdf
  /usr/tech/tsmc018/T-018-MM-TM-002.pdf