Tywaves: A Typed Waveform Viewer for Chisel

TL;DR

Tywaves introduces a type-centered waveform viewer that enhances debugging for Chisel hardware designs by preserving type information and data hierarchies, improving the debugging experience compared to traditional tools.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel type-centered debugging format and integrates it into Chisel, CIRCT MLIR, and Surfer, significantly improving waveform visualization for hardware design.

Findings

Enhanced debugging with preserved type information

Improved visualization of data hierarchies in waveforms

Better support for Chisel HDL in waveform viewers

Abstract

Chisel (Constructing Hardware In a Scala Embedded Language) is a broadly adopted HDL that brings object-oriented and functional programming, type-safety, and parameterization to hardware design. However, while these language features significantly improve the process of writing code, debugging Chisel designs with open source tools loses many of the advantages of the source language, as type information and data structure hierarchies are lost in the translation, simulator output, and waveform viewer. This work, Tywaves, presents a new type-centered debugging format that brings the same level of abstraction found in contemporary hardware languages to waveform viewers. Contributions to the Chisel library and CIRCT MLIR compiler as well as the Surfer waveform viewer result in a waveform viewer that better supports the Chisel HDL. Project url: https://github.com/rameloni/tywaves-chisel-demo