Everything starts off with some form of specification, be it a natural language document, an informal form such as an executable model, or a more formal form such as a mathematical specification. Just as the specification defines the intended function and scope of the product (i.e., the domain), the platform and architectural requirements that go along with it define many of the operating and nonfunctional bounds of the system. This can be anything from its size and weight to its power consumption. This chapter describes both the functional and nonfunctional requirements of ESL systems.

6.1 The Problem of Specification
    6.1.1 The Implementation and Ambiguity Problems
    6.1.2 The Heterogeneous Technology and Single-Source Problems
    6.1.3 Architectures, Attributes, and Behavior
    6.1.4 Formal and Executable Specifications and Modeling
6.2 Requirements Management and Paper Specifications
    6.2.1 Case Study: Requirements Management Process at Vandelay Industries
6.3 ESL Domains
    6.3.1 Dataflow and Control Flow
    6.3.2 Protocol Stacks
    6.3.3 Embedded Systems
6.4 Executable Specifications
    6.4.1 Transaction-Level Modeling and Executable Specifications
    6.4.2 Executable Specifications and the Single-Source Problem
6.5 Some ESL Languages for Specification
    6.5.1 MATLAB
    6.5.2 Rosetta
    6.5.3 SystemC
        6.5.3.1 Main Language Features
    6.5.4 SystemVerilog
    6.5.5 Specification and Description Language
    6.5.6 The Unified Modeling Language
    6.5.7 Extensible Markup Language
    6.5.8 Bluespec
    6.5.9 Aspect-Oriented Languages
6.6 Provocative Thoughts: Model-Based Development
    6.6.1 Model-Driven Architecture
    6.6.2 Software/Hardware Co-Design
    6.6.3 Hardware
    6.6.4 How to Use MDD
6.7 Summary
6.8 The Prescription

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