OASIS-based data preparation flows: progress report on containing data size explosion

Abstract

The ever-increasing complexity of integrated circuits and their enabling process technology has accelerated the increase in data volume of post-RET data which is input to the photomask manufacturing industry. OASIS - the new stream format that has been developed by a working group under the sponsorship of the SEMI Data Path Task Force enables the representation of IC layout data in a much more compact form than GDSII and facilitates the incorporation of hierarchical data into the mask-making infrastructure. OASIS achieves on average a >10x reduction in file size compared to GDSII files and structures the data in a way, which allows a straightforward translation from a hierarchical format to the required flat mask perspective. Owing to the efficiency in representing the data, OASIS files are smaller than commonly used flat exchange formats - like MEBES, thus enabling an efficient hierarchical data flow both from the processing as well as the file handling prospective. The implementation of OASIS into post-tapeout data flows will be discussed and experimental results on OASIS-based data preparation flows will be shown.