Being able to author a test (verification) plan in a collaborative team environment is an important aspect of both Plan Driven and Requirements Driven methodologies. Once the test plan is defined, the common verification process is driven by ensuring that all the design features are being successfully tested. This is achieved by linking the tests and coverage model references defined within a test plan to the results of verification. The connection from the test plan to the design specification can be loosely bridged by the Verification Engineer. Alternatively, a requirements management system can hierarchically decompose system requirements through to hardware/software requirements, and onto test plans with verification results. This detailed level of traceability is a requirement of functional safety standards such as ISO 26262 or DO-254. There may also be demands for traceability and audit between the design requirements and the VHDL/Verilog implementation. Ideally a smooth path should exist between the two methodologies, enabling a project to migrate from Plan Driven to Requirements Driven when it becomes necessary to fulfill the demands of safety critical standards. As well, an ideal solution should be agnostic to allow different data formats and tools to be supported. This session will highlight that Siemens and Mentor are in a great position and can offer a single solution to address both Plan Driven and Requirements Driven verification methodologies.
