The --prof-threads option has been split into two independent options:
1. --prof-exec, for collecting verilator_gantt and other execution
related profiling data, and
2. --prof-pgo, for collecting data needed for PGO
The implementation of execution profiling is extricated from
VlThreadPool and is now a separate class VlExecutionProfiler. This means
--prof-exec can now be used for single-threaded models (though it does
not measure a lot of things just yet). For consistency VerilatedProfiler
is renamed VlPgoProfiler. Both VlExecutionProfiler and VlPgoProfiler are
in verilated_profiler.{h/cpp}, but can be used completely independently.
Also re-worked the execution profile format so it now only emits events
without holding onto any temporaries. This is in preparation for some
future optimizations that would be hindered by the introduction of function
locals via AstText.
Also removed the Barrier event. Clearing the profile buffers is not
notably more expensive as the profiling records are trivially
destructible.
This patch implements #3032. Verilator creates a module representing the
SystemVerilog $root scope (V3LinkLevel::wrapTop). Until now, this was
called the "TOP" module, which also acted as the user instantiated model
class. Syms used to hold a pointer to this root module, but hold
instances of any submodule. This patch renames this root scope module
from "TOP" to "$root", and introduces a separate model class which is
now an interface class. As the root module is no longer the user
interface class, it can now be made an instance of Syms, just like any
other submodule. This allows absolute references into the root module to
avoid an additional pointer indirection resulting in a potential speedup
(about 1.5% on OpenTitan). The model class now also contains all non
design specific generated code (e.g.: eval loops, trace config, etc),
which additionally simplifies Verilator internals.
Please see the updated documentation for the model interface changes.