Dvd analysis that accounts for delays

Abstract

Techniques for computer aided design and engineering of integrated circuits can use group identifiers of correlated signals and time delay values when using vectorless dynamic voltage drop (DVD) simulations and when using other types of simulations or analyses of a circuit design. A method in one embodiment can include the operations of: receiving a design representing an electrical circuit that includes a plurality of pins, the plurality of pins including one or more input nodes or one or more output nodes in the electrical circuit; identifying, in the design, one or more groups of pins that are correlated such that, within each identified group, all of the pins in the identified groups switch between voltage states in a correlated way; assigning, for each pin in each identified group, an identifier for the identified group and a time delay value based on the pin's delay from an initial point in the identified group's logic chain to the pin. The group identifier and the time delay at each pin can limit the switching activities in the DVD simulations to reduce pessimistic results from the simulations. Other methods are described, and data processing systems and machine readable media that cause such systems to perform these methods are also described.