How to use tracepoints in DVT Eclipse IDE

Overview

In DVT you can efficiently perform interactive debugging, for example during the UVM Runtime Elaboration.

This video demonstrates how to inject debug printouts at runtime without altering the code.

This video was made using DVT 25.1.10

Details

Introduction

Tracepoints enable you to inject debug printouts at runtime without altering the code. This can prove particularly useful when you want to print debug messages from read-only code, or you want to easily toggle particular debug messages on and off at any time during execution.

Using tracepoints

To quickly add a tracepoint, right click on the editor vertical bar and select Toggle tracepoint. A breakpoint is created and its condition is automatically filled in with a display containing a default message.

The call to $display() follows the syntax and semantics defined by the SystemVerilog LRM, it's basically as if you wrote it in the source file on this line.

In the expression, you can use any variable or function visible at this point in code. Content assist is available, just press CTRL + Space to see the proposals.

Notice that the messages were printed in the console and execution did not suspend when the tracepoint was reached.

A disabled tracepoint does not print anything.