How to use inherited connections

Help resources

• IC-6146.14 → Virtuoso Schematic Editor → Virtuoso Schematic Editor L User Guide; → Understanding Connectivity and Naming Conventions → Inherited Connections
• IC-6146.14 → Virtuoso Layout Suite → Virtuoso Layout Suite L User Guide → Editing and Defining Properties → Using Net Expressions and Inherited Connections

Inherited connections provide a convenient way to use multiple power supplies in a design by defining a single power supply in a low-level schematic that is overridable. This can reduce the need to draw power and gnd pin connections explicitly on each symbol (useful for digital gates). In this how-to, a method for using and defining inherited connections will be given.

Note, the NCSU Design Toolkit replaces the basic library from Cadence with its own which may not have the vdd_inherit or gnd_inherit cells. To add this library to your CDS project with the name basic_cds, add the following line to the cds.lib file:

DEFINE basic_cds $IC/tools/dfII/etc/cdslib/basic

Inherited connections use Net Expressions in Cadence which provide a way of renaming a net. There are four components of a net expression (ex. [@search property name:%:default global search name]):

1. search scope
2. search property name
3. format instruction
4. default global search name - shows what the wire or pin is connected to by default

When a net expression is formed, an asterisk (*) is shown after the global name indicating that it is a net expression.

In the basic_cds library, there are four inherited supply symbols. These are given in the table below along with their associated net exprssion label:

Inherited Supply Symbol	Net Expression Label
vcc_inherit	[@vcc:%:vcc!]
vdd_inherit	[@vdd:%:vdd!]
gnd_inherit	[@gnd:%:gnd!]
vss_inherit	[@vss:%:vss!]