Overview

Computer architects have long relied on software simulation to measure dynamic performance metrics (e.g., CPI) of a proposed design. Unfortunately, with the ever-growing size and com­plexity of modern microprocessors, detailed software simulators have become four or more orders of mag­nitude slower than their hardware counterparts. The low simulation throughput is especially prohibitive for large-scale multiprocessor systems because the simulation turnaround for these systems grows at least lin­early with the number of processors. Slow simulation has barred researchers from attempting complete benchmarks and input sets or realistic system sizes on detailed simulators. The SimFlex project targets fast, accurate and flexible simulation of large-scale systems.

SimFlex is proceeding along two synergistic fronts:

  • Flexus is a powerful and flexible simulator framework that allows full-system simulation that relies heavily on well-defined component interface models to facilitate both model integration and compile-time simulator optimization.

  • SMARTS applies rigorous statistical sampling the­ory to reduce simulation turnaround by several orders of magnitude, while achieving high accuracy and confidence in estimates.

Recent News

01/18/2016 - A tutorial, Server Benchmarking with CloudSuite 3.0, will be presented on April 18th at EuroSys 2016.

12/20/2015 - A tutorial, Server Benchmarking with CloudSuite 3.0, will be presented on January 20th at HiPEAC 2016.

02/02/2015 - A two-day tutorial, Rigorous and Practical Server Design Evaluation , will be presented on February 2nd-3rd at EPFL. Here are the tutorial slides used on the first day and the second day.

03/01/2014 - The Simflex methodology will be presented at the Rigorous and Practical Server Design Evaluation tutorial in conjuction with ISPASS'14 in Monterey, CA.

06/23/2013 - CloudSuite 2.0 on Flexus tutorial presented on June 23rd, 2013 at ISCA. Here are the tutorial slides.

06/26/2012 - CloudSuite on Flexus tutorial presented on June 9th, 2012 at ISCA. Here are the tutorial slides and the guidelines for using the released Simics images.

06/17/2012 - Flexus 4.1.0 has been released.

06/09/2012 - Full-day CloudSuite on Flexus tutorial will be presented at ISCA'12.

06/17/2010 - Flexus 4.0.0 has been released.

12/12/2009 - Full-day SimFlex and ProtoFlex tutorial will be presented at MICRO'09.

12/15/2008 - Slides for the SimFlex/ProtoFlex tutorial (presented at PACT) are available here.

12/03/2007 - Flexus 3.0.0 has been released.

07/06/2006 - Flexus 2.1.1, which fixes an out-of-order core deadlock in 2.1.0, has been released.

06/16/2006 - Flexus 2.1.0 has been released.

06/15/2006 - Slides for the upcoming SimFlex tutorial are available here.

02/27/2006 - The second SimFlex tutorial will be presented at ISCA 33.

11/09/2005 - Slides for the SimFlex tutorial (presented at MICRO in Barcelona) are available here.

11/09/2005 - Flexus 2.0.0 has been released.

09/19/2005 - The first SimFlex tutorial will be presented at Micro 38.