Buffer Location Constraints - 2023.1 English

The AI Engine compiler tries to automatically allocate buffers for buffers, lookup tables, and run-time parameters in the most efficient manner possible. However, you might want to explicitly control their placement in memory. Similar to the kernels shown previously in this section, buffers inferred on a kernel port can also be constrained to be mapped to specific tiles, banks, or even address offsets using location constraints, as shown in the following example.

#include <adf.h>
#include "kernels.h"
#define NUMCORES (COLS*ROWS) 
using namespace adf;

template <int COLS, int ROWS, int STARTCOL, int STARTROW>
class indep_nodes_graph2 : public graph {
 public:
   kernel kr[NUMCORES];
   port<input> datain[NUMCORES] ;
   port<output> dataout[NUMCORES] ;
  
 indep_nodes_graph() {
  for (int i = 0; i < COLS; i++) {
    for (int j = 0; j < ROWS; j++) {
      int k = i*ROWS + j;
      kr[k] = kernel::create(mykernel);
      source(kr[k])  = "kernels/kernel.cc";
      runtime<ratio>(kr[k]) = 0.9;
      location<kernel>(kr[k]) = tile(STARTCOL+i, STARTROW+j); // kernel location
      location<buffer>(kr[k].in[0]) = 
        { address(STARTCOL+i, STARTROW+j, 0x0), 
          address(STARTCOL+i, STARTROW+j, 0x2000) };          // double buffer location
      location<stack>(kr[k]) = bank(STARTCOL+i, STARTROW+j, 2); // stack location
      location<buffer>(kr[k].out[0]) = location<kernel>(kr[k]); // relative buffer location
    }
  }

  for (int i = 0; i < NUMCORES; i++) {
    connect(datain[i], kr[i].in[0]);
    connect(kr[i].out[0], dataout[i]);
  }
 };
};

In the previous code, the location of double buffers at port kr[k].in[0] is constrained to the specific memory tile address offsets that are created using the address(col,row,offset) constructor. Furthermore, the location of the system memory (including the sync buffer, stack and static heap) for the processor that executes kernel instance kr[k] is constrained to a particular bank using the bank(col,row,bankid) constructor. Finally, the tile location of the buffers connected to the port kr[k].out[0] is constrained to be the same tile as that of the kernel instance kr[k]. Buffer location constraints are applied on kernel buffer ports.