Theory of latency-insensitive design

The theory of latency-insensitive design is presented as the foundation of a new correct-by-construction methodology to design complex systems by asse mbling intellectual property components. Latency-insensitive designs are sy nchronous distributed systems and are realized by composing functional modu les that exchange data on communication channels according to an appropriat e protocol. The protocol works on the assumption that the modules are stall able, a weak condition to ask them to obey. The goal of the protocol is to guarantee that latency-insensitive designs composed of functionally correct modules behave correctly independently of the channel latencies. This allo ws us to increase the robustness of a design implementation because any del ay variations of a channel can be "recovered" by changing the channel laten cy while the overall system functionality remains unaffected. As a conseque nce, an important application of the proposed theory is represented by the latency-insensitive methodology to design large digital integrated circuits by using deep submicrometer technologies.