Reconfigurable devices are used in different ways for the design of embedde
d systems. As reconfigurable computing is a rather new field, there is stil
l a lack of design methodologies and tools. Previous work on design automat
ion for reconfigurable systems focused on partitioning and scheduling. The
authors present an approach to communication synthesis in reconfigurable em
bedded systems. Using the proposed methodology, the designer can focus on t
he functional behavior of the design and on the evaluation of different map
pings. All the low-level details of the reconfigurable resource are hidden.
In the paper, the authors first classify communication types in reconfigur
able systems, covering both compile-time and run-time reconfiguration. Then
they describe their tool suite CORES/HASIS that generates interface circui
try to connect communicating tasks in reconfigurable systems. The tasks may
be mapped onto the same or onto different FPGAs. The tools multiplex sever
al logical communication channels over one physical channel, insert routing
nodes to connect tasks on nonadjacent devices, and provide dedicated inter
faces that solve the problem of interconfiguration communication. A case st
udy demonstrates the usability and efficiency of the approach.