Specification of the hierarchy, connectivity, and graphical representation of a circuit design

An apparatus for creating a circuit design, comprising:

• means for instantiating a plurality of objects in response to execution of an object-oriented program, the objects having hierarchy attributes, connectivity attributes, and display attributes that describe a plurality of modules, wherein the hierarchy attributes define parent-child relationships between modules, the connectivity attributes define input-output connections between modules, and the display attributes define a layout of the modules for viewing, wherein each of the objects has an associated method for generating a first design specification in a first format, and the plurality of objects include frame-type objects, each frame-type object having attributes that specify a display location of the associated frame, and each child module has at least one frame-type object that specifies a display location of the child module within a frame-type object associated with a parent module of the child module;
• means for generating the first design specification from the plurality of objects;
• and
• means for displaying the modules and logic elements in accordance with the display attributes.

A method for creating a circuit design, comprising:

• instantiating a plurality of objects in response to execution of an object-oriented program, the objects having hierarchy attributes, connectivity attributes, and display attributes that describe a plurality of modules, wherein the hierarchy attributes define parent-child relationships between modules, the connectivity attributes define input-output connections between modules, and the display attributes specify relative positions of the modules for display on a monitor independent of placement information for physical locations of the modules on a semiconductor device, wherein each of the objects has an associated method for generating a first design specification in a first format, and for at least one parent module and at least one child module having a parent-child relationship the display attributes specify a display location of the child module within the parent module;
• generating the first design specification from the plurality of objects;
• and
• displaying the modules and logic elements in accordance with the display attributes.