Deductive Hardware Design: A Functional Approach

The goal of deductive design is the systematic construction of a system implementation starting from its behavioural specification according to formal, provably correct rules. We use Gofer/Haskell to formulate a functional model of directional, synchronous and deterministic systems with discrete time. The associated algebraic laws are then employed in deductive hardware design of basic combinational and sequential circuits as well as a brief account of pipelining. With this we tackle several of the IFIP WG 10.5 benchmark verification problems. Special emphasis is laid on parameterisation and re-usability aspects. Part I: Introduction 1. Deductive Design The goal of deductive design is the systematic construction of a system implementation starting from its behavioural specification, according to formal, provably correct rules. The main advantages are the following. The resulting implementation is correct by construction; The rules can be formulated schematically, independent of the particular application area; Hence they are re-usable for wide classes of similar problems; Being formal, the design process can be assisted by machine. 1 To appear in: B. Möller, J.V. Tucker (eds.): Prospects of Hardware Foundations. Springer LNCS (in preparation). This research was partially sponsored by Esprit Working Group 8533 NADA – New Hardware Design Methods.