Method and apparatus for dynamic port provisioning within a programmable logic device
AssigneeXilinx, Inc.
InventorsDavid E. Tetzlaff, Marwan M. Hassoun
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method and apparatus to allow dynamic port provisioning of communication ports within a Programmable Logic Device (PLD). The dynamic port provisioning combines configuration of serial Input/Output (I/O) devices with simultaneous reconfiguration of a portion of programmable logic resources within the PLD and processor functions to implement a particular communication protocol. The dynamic port provisioning is facilitated for a single channel, without affecting the dynamic port provisioning of other communication channels operating within the PLD.
Claims19
A method of provisioning communication ports in a programmable device, the method comprising:
- initially configuring a plurality of multi-gigabit transceivers (MGTs) and corresponding sets of configurable resources to implement one or more communication protocols;
- activating communications with the plurality of MGTs in accordance with the one or more communication protocols;
- deactivating one of the plurality of MGTs, wherein at least one MGT attribute is reconfigured relative to the initial MGT configuration;
- and
- reconfiguring the set of configurable resources corresponding to the deactivated MGT while continuing communications with the activated MGTs,
- wherein the reconfiguring the at least one MGT attribute includes changing a data coding format used to encode data prior to transmission and changing data alignment characters used to separate the data to be transmitted.
A method of activating multiple communication ports of an integrated circuit (IC), the method comprising:
- configuring a multi-gigabit transceiver (MGT) and an associated set of reconfigurable logic resources associated with each communication port of the IC;
- establishing communications with each communication port of the IC, wherein each communication port is configured in accordance with a communication protocol;
- and
- reconfiguring one of the communication ports while maintaining each of the other communication ports in an active communication state,
- wherein the reconfiguring includes changing a data coding format used to encode data prior to transmission and changing data alignment characters used to separate the data to be transmitted.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.