Reconfigurable computing: a survey of systems and software

  • Authors:
  • Katherine Compton;Scott Hauck

  • Affiliations:
  • Northwestern University;University of Washington

  • Venue:
  • ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR)
  • Year:
  • 2002

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Abstract

Due to its potential to greatly accelerate a wide variety of applications, reconfigurable computing has become a subject of a great deal of research. Its key feature is the ability to perform computations in hardware to increase performance, while retaining much of the flexibility of a software solution. In this survey, we explore the hardware aspects of reconfigurable computing machines, from single chip architectures to multi-chip systems, including internal structures and external coupling. We also focus on the software that targets these machines, such as compilation tools that map high-level algorithms directly to the reconfigurable substrate. Finally, we consider the issues involved in run-time reconfigurable systems, which reuse the configurable hardware during program execution.