Juan Arturo Garza developed and stabilized a RISC-V-based microcontroller core for the Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU repository, focusing on robust pipeline architecture and FPGA deployment readiness. He enhanced the core with AXI Stream FIFO integration, comprehensive debug instrumentation, and BRAM-backed memory, using Verilog, C, and Python scripting. His work included refining hazard detection, implementing pipeline stalling, and expanding automated test coverage to improve reliability and maintainability. By addressing instruction memory stall handling and aligning the design with FPGA synthesis requirements, Juan delivered a hardware/software stack that supports efficient debugging, scalable verification, and predictable operation across diverse embedded and emulation environments.
Month 2025-04 — Focused on stabilizing the SwitchMCU instruction pipeline and improving instruction fetch behavior. Completed a critical bug fix in the Instruction Memory Stall Handling, including a refactor of the state machine to ensure correct requests and stalls across diverse pipeline conditions, enabling more reliable and predictable MCU operation.
Month 2025-04 — Focused on stabilizing the SwitchMCU instruction pipeline and improving instruction fetch behavior. Completed a critical bug fix in the Instruction Memory Stall Handling, including a refactor of the state machine to ensure correct requests and stalls across diverse pipeline conditions, enabling more reliable and predictable MCU operation.
March 2025 focused on delivering a robust hardware/software integration stack for Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU: BRAM-backed memory architecture, corrected RISC-V core behavior with expanded test coverage, and FPGA deployment readiness through 2001-Verilog conformance and scaffolding. These efforts increased hardware emulation fidelity, reduced validation risk, and accelerated FPGA integration for SwitchMCU deployments.
March 2025 focused on delivering a robust hardware/software integration stack for Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU: BRAM-backed memory architecture, corrected RISC-V core behavior with expanded test coverage, and FPGA deployment readiness through 2001-Verilog conformance and scaffolding. These efforts increased hardware emulation fidelity, reduced validation risk, and accelerated FPGA integration for SwitchMCU deployments.
February 2025 (2025-02) – SwitchMCU project delivered enhanced observability, pipeline reliability, and FPGA readiness across Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU. Implemented end-to-end debug instrumentation and logging, hardened hazards/forwarding logic, expanded test infrastructure, introduced pipeline stalling with mem_stall, and improved BRAM usage and organization. These changes deliver clearer telemetry, faster debugging, more robust timing behavior, and higher maintainability, enabling safer feature delivery and smoother FPGA deployments. Note: memory addressing bug in the C memory load path was identified but not fixed in this batch and will be prioritized next sprint.
February 2025 (2025-02) – SwitchMCU project delivered enhanced observability, pipeline reliability, and FPGA readiness across Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU. Implemented end-to-end debug instrumentation and logging, hardened hazards/forwarding logic, expanded test infrastructure, introduced pipeline stalling with mem_stall, and improved BRAM usage and organization. These changes deliver clearer telemetry, faster debugging, more robust timing behavior, and higher maintainability, enabling safer feature delivery and smoother FPGA deployments. Note: memory addressing bug in the C memory load path was identified but not fixed in this batch and will be prioritized next sprint.
January 2025 — Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU: Delivered baseline RISC-V core enhancements with AXI Stream FIFO, CSR access, and a build/simulation Makefile; implemented memory-to-register load and refined branch handling to establish hazard-detection groundwork. Achieved substantial repo hygiene with removal of unused files and expanded documentation. While full hazard protection remains in progress, the changes improve testability, debugging, and future feature velocity, demonstrating proficiency in hardware design, verification, and automation.
January 2025 — Rice-MECE-Capstone-Projects/SwitchMCU: Delivered baseline RISC-V core enhancements with AXI Stream FIFO, CSR access, and a build/simulation Makefile; implemented memory-to-register load and refined branch handling to establish hazard-detection groundwork. Achieved substantial repo hygiene with removal of unused files and expanded documentation. While full hazard protection remains in progress, the changes improve testability, debugging, and future feature velocity, demonstrating proficiency in hardware design, verification, and automation.
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