1 A New ATPG Algorithm for 21 st Century : The Simplest But Powerful

In this paper, we proposed a new ATPG (Automatic Test Pattern Generation) algorithm that can be easily implemented and learned by college level student while achieving fairly efficient fault coverage and fast generation time. Very high level algorithm and its decision tree have been illustrated. The output of the ATPG program is the set of test vectors generated by the new algorithm. The significance of the algorithm is in the initializing PIs (Primary Inputs) technique. Unlike like other algorithms that start off with the unknown (pre-defined as X) PIs values or random (or pseudorandom) PIs values [1], the new algorithm assigns all PIs values to be non-controlling values according to the gate which the PI fan-in to. This suggestion seemed to be an interesting solution for simple but powerful algorithm. Unfortunately, implementation on software has not completed. However, we hand-calculated the TPG vectors using our new algorithm and compared it with the vectors that Hitec/Proofs generated. We found the potential advantages of our algorithm over algorithm that Hitec/Proofs used when testing on c17 bench circuit.