Welcome
Welcome to my website for resources on Radio Frequency and Analog-Mixed Signal system architecting.
What is System Architecture
A system architecture or systems architecture is the conceptual model that defines the structure, behavior, and more views of a system. An architecture description is a formal description and representation of a system, organized in a way that supports reasoning about the structure of the system which comprises system components, the externally visible properties of those components, the relationships (e.g. the behavior) between them, and provides a plan from which products can be procured, and systems developed, that will work together to implement the overall system.
Who is a System Architect
The systems architect establishes the basic structure of the system, defining the essential core design features and elements that provide the framework for all that follows, and are the hardest to change later. The systems architect provides the architects view of the users' vision for what the system needs to be and do, and the paths along which it must be able to evolve, and strives to maintain the integrity of that vision as it evolves during detailed design and implementation.
Role of a System Architect
In systems design, the architects and engineers are responsible for:
- Interfacing with the user(s) and sponsor(s) and all other stakeholders in order to determine their (evolving) needs.
- Generating the highest level of system requirements, based on the user's needs and other constraints such as cost and schedule.
- Ensuring that this set of high level requirements is consistent, complete, correct, and operationally defined.
- Performing cost-benefit analyses to determine whether requirements are best met by manual, software, or hardware functions; making maximum use of commercial off-the-shelf or already developed components.
- Developing partitioning algorithms (and other processes) to allocate all present and foreseeable requirements into discrete partitions such that a minimum of communications is needed among partitions, and between the user and the system.
- Partitioning large systems into (successive layers of) subsystems and components each of which can be handled by a single engineer or team of engineers or subordinate architect.
- Interfacing with the design and implementation engineers and architects, so that any problems arising during design or implementation can be resolved in accordance with the fundamental design concepts, and user needs and constraints.
- Ensuring that a maximally robust design is developed.
- Generating a set of acceptance test requirements, together with the designers, test engineers, and the user, which determine that all of the high level requirements have been met, especially for the computer-human-interface.
- Generating products such as sketches, models, an early user guide, and prototypes to keep the user and the engineers constantly up to date and in agreement on the system to be provided as it is evolving.
- Ensuring that all architectural products and products with architectural input are maintained in the most current state and never allowed to become obsolete.
The system architect is the Renaissance man (or woman) of computing, at least relative to the organization is which he/she works. Sometimes derogatorily called a "jack of all trades, master of none", the system architect should, indeed, be a jack of all trades, but will be a master of some, advanced in others, and at least intermediate in just about everything else. In a larger corporate environment today, the system architect should have knowledge and skill in most or all of the following areas.
About Me
My name is Sumit Adhikari and I am a lead scientist in the field of RF/AMS architecture designing. I have worked for industry for several years and currently working with Vienna University of Technology on system architecting in the group of Prof. Christoph Grimm. My interest mainly lies on :
- RF Transceivers
- Analog Signal Processing
- Digital Signal Processing
- Standardizing High-Level Architecture Designing Language - Like SystemC-AMS
- Definition of MoCs on the top of SystemC-AMS Layer
- Sensor Dynamics and Sensor Design
- High-Level Non-Linear Solver Development
List of Publications
- Sumit Adhikari and Christoph Grimm, Modeling Switched Capacitor Sigma Delta Modulator Nonidealities in SystemC-AMS (Invited Paper), Proceedings of Forum on Specification and Design Languages (FDL2010), Southampton, England, (2010), Page. 216 - 221
- Muhammad Farooq, Sumit Adhikari, Jan Haase and Christoph Grimm, Modeling Methodology in SystemC-AMS for Embedded Analog Mixed Signal Systems, Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Frontiers of Information Technology (FIT2010), Islamabad, Pakistan (2010), Article Number-27
- Sumit Adhikari, Muhammad Farooq, Jan Haase and Christoph Grimm, High Performance Adaptive Sensor Interface Design Through Model Based Estimation of Analog Non-Idealities, Proceedings of 14th IEEE Symposium on Design & Diagnostic of Electronic Circuits & Systems (DDECS2011), Cottbus, Germany (2011), Page 41 - 46
- Yaseen Zaidi, Sumit Adhikari and Christoph Grimm, Abstract Modeling and Simulation Based Selective Estimation, Proceedings of 14th IEEE Symposium on Design & Diagnostic of Electronic Circuits & Systems (DDECS2011), Cottbus, Germany (2011), Page 275 - 278
- Sumit Adhikari, Yaseen Zaidi and Christoph Grimm, Architectural Mitigation for High Performance Energy Measurement, Proceedings of IEEE 20th European Conference on Circuit Theory and Design (ECCTD2011), Linkoping, Sweden (2011), Page 205 - 208
- Sumit Adhikari, Christoph Grimm and Jan Haase, Abstract Modelling and Estimation of High Performance Tobey’s PGA, Proceedings of Forum for Design Languages (FDL2011), Oldenburg, Germany (2011), Page 1 - 6
- Sumit Adhikari, Florian Schupfer and Christoph Grimm, Parametric Synthesis and Extraction of Analog-ESL Designs , Proceedings of Virtual Worldwide Forum for PhD Researchers in Electronic Design Automation (VW-FEDA2011), Southampton, England (2011), Page 1 - 6
- Sumit Adhikari, Florian Schupfer and Christoph Grimm, Generic Droop Correction IIR Filter Design Algorithm , Proceedings of 11th IFAC/IEEE International Conference on Programmable Devices and Embedded Systems (PDeS2012), Brunn, Czech Republic, Page 7-11
- Sumit Adhikari, Florian Schupfer and Christoph Grimm, Fast Optimization of Analog Amplifier Architecture Using Simulated Annealing , Proceedings of Forum for Design Languages (FDL2012), Vienna, Austria (2012), Page 1 - 6,
- Sumit Adhikari, Florian Schupfer and Christoph Grimm, Co-Simulation Framework for Variation Analysis of Radio Frequency Transceivers, Proceedings of System, Software, SoC and Silicon Debug Conference, Vienna, Austria (2012), Page 1 - 6
List of Presentations and Tutorials
- Sumit Adhikari and Christoph Grimm, Reactive TDF - An Idea for Enhancement of TDF for Supporting Architecture Exploration and Refinement, OSCI SystemC AMS Working Group Face to Face Meeting (F2F2010), ST Microelectronics, Grenoble, France (Nov-Dec 2010)
- Christoph Grimm, Joseph G.O. Wenninger, Stefan Mahlknecht, Jan Haase, Christian Hambeck, Sumit Adhikari, Florian Brame, Franz Lukasch, Johann Glaser, Javiero Moreno, R. Matischek, Design and Power Profiling of Ultra-Low Power Wireless Sensor Nets, Analog 2011 (A2011), Erlangen, Germany(2011)
- Sumit Adhikari, Markus Damm, Christoph Grimm, Francois Pechuex, Design of Mixed-Signal Systems using SystemC AMS extensions, VLSI Design Conference (VLSID2012), January 7-11, Hyderabad, India (2012)