Method and system for automatically accessing internal signals or ports in a design hierarchy

A hierarchical path database generator comprising:

• a database;
• an extractor for receiving a set of design files representing a design of an integrated circuit, for determining ports and signals in said design files, and for storing the ports and signals in the database in a logical hierarchical order, each of said ports and signals having a name;
• and
• a crawler for searching through the database to identify conflicting names therein, and when conflicting names are found in the database, to change one or more of the conflicting names to eliminate conflicts between the names.

An article of manufacture comprising a program storage device readable by computer, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the computer to perform method steps for accessing internal signal or port names in a design hierarchy of an integrated circuit design, said design including a multitude of design files, said method steps comprising:

• receiving said design files in a hierarchical path database generator;
• said hierarchical path database generator determining ports and signals in said design files, and storing said ports and signals in a hierarchical database in a logical hierarchical order, each of the ports and signals having a name;
• receiving from a testcase, used to verify a defined aspect of the integrated circuit design, specified signal and port names;
• and
• for each of the specified signal and port names, inputting said each name into the hierarchical path database generator, and obtaining from the hierarchical path database generator a hierarchical path associated with said each signal and port name, said hierarchical path being in the design hierarchy of the integrated circuit design.