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Glossary

TermDefinition
UxHwSignaloid's distribution-extended computation model, realized in silicon on the compute modules and in the Signaloid Cloud Compute Engine (SCCE).
Signaloid SoCThe canonical name for the core compute IP that runs on a module in its coprocessor mode.
MMIO interfacing modelThe shared memory-mapped I/O model through which a host communicates with any module.
Compute moduleA Signaloid hardware product that runs the Signaloid SoC as a UxHw coprocessor (C0-microSD, C0-microSD+).
Operational modeA distinct behavior of a module. Every module is single-mode except the C0-microSD.
Bootloader modeA C0-microSD-only mode used to program the device.
Custom user bitstreamA user-authored FPGA bitstream, supported only on the C0-microSD.
WarmbootThe iCE40 FPGA capability the C0-microSD bootloader uses to reconfigure the FPGA from one of several stored images at power-up.
MOSI / MISO bufferShared MMIO data buffers for host→device (MOSI) and device→host (MISO) bulk transfer.
XIPExecute-in-place: running code directly from SPI flash instead of copying it into RAM first (a C0-microSD+ execution mode, selected at build time with MODE := xip).
SectorThe 4 KiB unit in which the SPI flash of a compute module erases. Writing to a sector erases all 4 KiB of it, so a write replaces the whole sector rather than only the bytes you supply.
Power cycleRemoving power from a module and restoring it. Every register returns to its default value and the module loses the contents of every memory, while the data held in the SPI flash survives.
Athens-8 / Athens-16UxHw distributional representation precision. Larger representation precision leads to more accurate distributional representations at the cost of fewer in-flight distributions.
iCE40 / CrossLink-NXLattice FPGA families used as the compute substrate of, respectively, the C0-microSD and the C0-microSD+.

Next steps

  • Compute Modules, the module family overview and how these docs are organized.
  • C0-microSD, the shipping microSD module and its three operational modes.
  • C0-microSD+, the UHS-II module that always boots into the Signaloid SoC.