CASE-HISTORIES ON KNOWLEDGE-BASED DESIGN SYSTEMS FOR LSI AND SOFTWARE

This paper describes, from a system architectural viewpoint, how knowl edge-based technologies have been utilized in developing EXLOG (an LSI circuit synthesis system) and SOFTEX (a software synthesis system) in side the authors' projects. Although the system architectures for EXLO G and SOFTEX started from the same production systems, consisting of t ransformation rules in the middle of the 1980's, both branched off in different directions in the 1990's. Based on experiences with EXLOG an d SOFTEX, the differences between LSI and software design models are d iscussed, and the future directions are indicated for the knowledge-ba sed design system architectures.