Testbenches
Testbench is the system’s top level component
- Its entity declaration does not contain any PORT signals
- It instantiates all the necessary components that comprise the system
Testbenches may serve three additional useful purposes:
- May generate stimulus for simulation:
- Behavioral descriptions can be used to generate input vectors
- May apply stimulus to the entity under test
- Locally declared signals can be connected to PORTS of components in the system
- May compare output responses with expected values
- Behavioral descriptions can be used to compare model outputs to expected responses
Notes:
The testbench is the self-contained top level component in the system hierarchy, Therefore, it does not have any I/O pins (I.e. there are not PORT signals in its entity)..
In addition to instantiating the necessary components necessary to describe the system, a testbench may contain a behavioral VHDL description which may be used to generate stimulus patterns to the system as well as expected results which can then be compared with the outputs of the system’s subcomponents.
It should be noted that many modern VHDL simulators provide versatile mechanisms for forcing or driving a VHDL model’s PORT signals via simulation scripts and such, thus making the use of testbenches often unnecessary