X-Amin provides a friendly and intuitive graphical interface which enables even the novice user to work easily with X-Amin. X-Amin is invoked in GUI mode by simply running the xamin executable. The X-Amin main window is shown below:

X-Amin's GUI provides menu- and dialog-controlled access to the majority of X-Amin's operations. The balance of X-Amin's operations can be executed using the GUI's Command Entry.

The main window is composed of several parts as described below.

Menu Bar

The menu bar contains the pull-down menus of X-Amin namely File, Edit, Command, Diagram, Analyze, Macro, History, Window and Help

File Menu: This menu contains functions for reading files and libraries, saving modified source files, printing diagrams and exporting HDL code.

 

Edit Menu: This menu contains controls for modifying HDL source files. The controls include Undo/Redo, Cut/Copy/Paste and Find & Replace.

 

Command Menu: This menu contains commonly used X-Amin commands. Commands which operate on signals only will be enabled only when a signal is selected in the Signals window. The commands on this menu control removing designs, linking designs and initializing & restricting signals.

 

Diagram Menu: The Diagram menu provides controls for creating the various diagrams supported by X-Amin. The diagrams in the bottom portion of the menu require that the design be linked before the diagram can be generated.

 

Analyze Menu: The Analyze menu contains controls for performing X-Amin's analysis functions. In all cases, designs must be linked before an analysis can be performed. Additionally, a signal must be selected in the Signals Window for the Prove and Eval functions.

 

Macro Menu: The Macro menu is used to control macro recording, saving, loading and playback for the HDL editor.

 

History Menu: The History menu displays the last 10 commands executed. Selecting an entry in the menu re-runs that command.

Window Menu: The Window menu contains controls for window manipulation as well as a list of open windows. Selecting an entry from the list of open windows will pop that window to the top of the display.

 

Help Menu: The Help menu contains controls for various help topics.

 

Tool Bars

The Tool bars are located beneath the Menu bar and contain pushbutton controls for most of the functions provided within the pull-down menus. The Tool bars are split into separate categories corresponding to the Menu bar menus (i.e. File tool bar, Command tool bar, etc.). Using the handle located on the left, each tool bar can be moved and relocated to a different position relative to the other tool bars. They can also be removed from the tool bar area and placed as top-level windows.

 

Component Window

The Component Window displays all the namespaces (i.e. modules) and libraries currently residing in X-Amin. The currently selected namespace is identified with the checkmark icon , and the linked namespaces are identified with the link icon .

Namespaces are organized into Designs which provide the capability to load same-named namespaces, which is needed, for example, when we need to perform logic-equivalency checking of different revisions of a namespace. Libraries are a set of components used as resources to Designs. Library entries cannot be viewed or analyzed separately from the Design in which they are used. See the Designs and Libraries section for more information.

The components window is relocatable. Using the handle at the top of the window, it can be moved to the top, bottom, left or right docking positions in the main window. It can also be lifted from the main window and operated as a separate top-level window.

 

Signals Window

The signals window displays the signals contained in the namespace selected in the Components window.

Each signal has an associated icon which identifies the type of signal it is:

: Input port
: Combinational internal signal
: Registered internal signal
: Combinational output port
: Registered output port
: Combinational bi-directional port
: Registered bi-directional port
: No connect

The bottom of the Signals window contains signal filter controls. The filter controls allow the user to remove signals from the display by category or by name. In the Signals Window screen shown above, the No Connect, and Bi-directional categories are filtered from the display. The Name filter box indicates that all other signal names should be shown (.*).

 

Main Workspace

The large panel in the main window is the Main Workspace which is used to display editor, diagram and analysis windows. The Main Workspace can be configured to display the windows in MDI format, tabbed window format, or as top-level windows. Furthermore, in MDI mode, the windows can be tiled or cascaded. In top-level mode, the windows are not actually contained within the Main Workspace but are created as new top-level windows.

 

Transcript Window

The Transcript Window, near the bottom of the main window, provides log, report, error/warning and history listings.

Using the handle on the left side of the Transcript Window, the window can be moved to the top, bottom, left, or right docking areas of the main window. The Transcript Window can also be lifted from the main window and operated as a separate top-level window.

 

Command Entry

The Command Entry, located below the Transcript Window, can be used to manually type in commands to be executed. For some users, typing commands is preferable to negotiating various menus and dialogs. Also, a few X-Amin commands are not available via the menus and must be entered using the Command Entry.

To manually execute a command, simply type the command with any command options into the Command Entry and press <enter>. Command history can be tranversed using the up- and down-arrow keys.

The command interpreter within X-Amin is TCL, so most valid TCL commands can be processed by X-Amin. Likewise, X-Amin's command syntax is TCL compatible.