September 12, 2003
SEMI releases Oasis as GDSII replacement
By Richard Goering
EE Times |
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SEMI Releases Oasis as GDSII
Replacement
SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — The Semiconductor
Equipment and Materials International (SEMI)
organization has approved Oasis, a compact data
format that may replace the venerable GDSII
layout format. With the Oasis specification
now available for downloading, work can start
on the readers and writers that will bring Oasis
to designers' desktops.
Oasis was developed by SEMI's data path
task force as a way of solving a huge problem:
the annual loss of billions of dollars due
to data inefficiency. Compared to GDSII stream
format, Oasis claims to be 10 to 50 times
more compact, to more efficiently represent
flat data, to be 64-bit compatible and requiring
no data preparation as long as the "dialect"
of the pattern generation or inspection system
is known.
The Oasis 1.0 proposal was first brought
to light in October 2002, and was approved
by the SEMI worldwide lithography committee
in July 2003. "It was a super clean ballot
with no objections at all," said Tom
Grebinski, chairman of the SEMI data path
task force.
With the Oasis specification available at
the SEMI Web site, EDA vendors and mask makers
can begin work on the readers and writers
that will be necessary to support it, Grebinski
said. He said source code for Oasis will eventually
be available, but that hasn't happened yet.
Grebinski said that in some ways the latest
Oasis specification is more advanced than
the original 1.0 proposal. For example, he
said, Oasis now has "spatial sorting,"
which provides direct access to data. "GDSII
has always been sequential, so you start at
the beginning every time you want to look
for a piece of information," he said.
"In Oasis, everything is direct access."
Despite Oasis' advantages, it's not a total
solution, Grebinski noted. That's why the
SEMI data path task force is working with
the Silicon Integration Initiative (Si2) to
develop a "universal data model"
(UDM), based on the OpenAccess database. It
will provide a common repository for all design
and manufacturing data.
At an August 2003 meeting, Si2 called for
a "design to mask coalition" that
could develop and promote a UDM.
That meeting also brought to light the creation
of a UDM working group, cochaired by Don Cottrell
of Si2 and Warren Grobman of Motorola. "Things
are pretty exciting," Grebinski said.
"We're trying to get consensus in a critical
mass of companies to fund the development
of the UDM."
As for Oasis, Grebinski said, the SEMI data
path task force intends to create a developer's
Web site that will provide tools for Oasis
implementers. The question now is how quickly
the major EDA vendors — who have already
voiced broad support for Oasis — will
implement it with their tools.
"We have actively participated in shaping
the Oasis standard since its inception,"
said Sanjiv Kaul, senior vice president and
general manager of new ventures at Synopsys.
"We will be working very closely with
our customers to determine appropriate timeframes
to release products that read or write to
Oasis."
Si2, meanwhile, is working with MicroEDA
Corp. to develop readers and writers between
Oasis and OpenAccess. Beta versions may be
available in the fourth quarter of 2003.
EDITOR'S NOTE: As of Friday,
Sept. 12, the Oasis specification had yet
to be posted on the SEMI web site. SEMI expects
to have it available "within a few days."
Meanwhile, the specification can be obtained
by sending e-mail to Tom Grebinski (tom@grebinski.com)
or Kurt Wampler (wampler@masktools.com).
