Introduction:
Currently, the "Goals" section of InTime's "Flow Properties" does not fully support the "Extra Opt Exploration" recipe.
For example, if you set "Recipe Goal" to "Speed - TNS" and "Goal Based Target" to "-0.3", after you start the "Extra Opt Exploration" recipe, InTime will not stop even if the result achieves a TNS result better or equal to -0.3ns.
Solution:
Starting from InTime version 2.6.9, a new INI file is introduced to extend the InTime Flow Properties for Vivado. With this INI file, you can now configure a properly-supported Goal for Extra Opt Exploration.
The INI file is called "vivado.ini" and it is located inside the <user home>/.plunify/<username>_<MAC_address>/ folder. For example:
-
- Linux: /home/<user_name>/.plunify/<user_name_mac_address>/vivado.ini
- Windows: C:\Users\<user_name>\.plunify\<user_name_user_mac_address>\vivado.ini
Please take note if you are using InTime version 2.6.9 or above for the first time, you will need to run any recipe first in order to initialize vivado.ini.
Typical contents of vivado.ini:
Section related to Extra Opt Exploration:
- goalType: Goal type: can be "tns" or "wns".
- goalTarget: Target value (in ns). If any strategy achieves this goal, InTime will immediately stop the recipe.
- maxRound: Highest number of iterations to run each strategy.
Conditions at which an Extra Opt Exploration strategy will cease execution:
- Current iteration of the strategy has achieved the goal. (goalTarget)
- Current iteration of the strategy reaches the maximum number of iterations. (maxRound)
- No further improvement in the results after 3 consecutive iterations.
Example:
To stop the Extra Opt Exploration strategy when it achieve WNS equal to or better than -0.3ns in at most 5 iterations, modify the [extra_opt] section as follows:
After modification, save the file, relaunch InTime and run the "Extra Opt Exploration" recipe.