A two-level approach to automated conformance testing of VHDL designs

For manufacturers of consumer electronics, conformance testing of embedded software is a vital issue. To improve performance, parts of this software are implemented in hardware, often designed in the Hardware Description Language VHDL. Conformance testing is a time consuming and error-prone process. Thus automating (parts of) this process is essential. There are many tools for test generation and for VHDL simulation. However, most test generation tools operate on a high level of abstraction and applying the generated tests to a VHDL design is a complicated task. For each specific case one can build a layer of dedicated circuitry and/or software that performs this task. It appears that the ad-hoc nature of this layer forms the bottleneck of the testing process. We propose a {em generic solution for bridging this gap: a generic layer of software dedicated to interface with VHDL implementations. It consists of a number of Von Neumann-like components that can be instantiated for each specific VHDL design. This paper reports on the construction of and some initial experiences with a concrete tool environment based on these principles

Development and clinical evaluation of a 3-step modified manipulation protocol for MRI-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound of uterine fibroids

__Objectives:__ The clinical applicability of magnetic resonance image−guided high-intensity focused ultrasound (MR-HIFU) treatment of uterine fibroids is often limited due to inaccessible fibroids or bowel interference. The aim of this study was to implement a newly developed 3-step modified manipulation protocol and to evaluate its influence on the number of eligible women and treatment fai

Use of multiparametric MRI to characterize uterine fibroid tissue types

Background: Although the biological characteristics of uterine fibroids (UF) have implications for therapy choice and effectiveness, there is limited MRI data about these characteristics. Currently, the Funaki classification and Scale

Automatic generation of MPEG test streams from high-level grammars

This paper describes a technique to generate complex, moving picture experts group (MPEG) data streams containing packets which range through a selected set of variants, as allowed by the grammar of the packet stream. The Prolog logic programming language has been used, whose declarative power allows data generation almost directly from the grammar, i.e. without the need for explicitly programming a grammar traversal mechanism as would be the case with an imperative language. A reasonably declarative style of grammar and variation definition is achieved, and at the same time, a reasonably efficient generation process. The basic idea is to use a declarative fragment of Prolog for the grammar, but to use imperative features of Prolog for matters like packet enumeration and packet payload generation. Generation of test data from grammars is not new, nor is the use of Prolog programs for generation of test data, but as far as we know, the combination of both has not reported on in the literature, nor its application to MPEG demultiplexers/decoder