FAST AND ACCURATE TIME-DOMAIN ANALYSIS OF PIECEWISE-LINEAR DYNAMICS CIRCUITS - THE COMPUTER-PROGRAM PILA

The computer program PILA (piecewise-linear analysis) is described. It is specially designed for exploring complicated dynamics of moderately sized piecewise-linear circuits. The DC-analysis is performed either by an adapted version of Katzenelson's algorithm or by an algorithm designed for solving the linear complementarity problem. If the user chooses the latter algorithm, he will get all solutions of the DC-problem, whereas with Katzenelson's algorithm usually just one solution is found. The time-domain analysis proceeds by the calculation of eigenvalues of the state matrix in order to obtain a time-symbolic solution in each linear region. This method is particularly fast and accurate, as long as the order of the circuit is not too high. The main errors occur in the determination of the transition between two adjacent linear regions. Particular care has been taken to get maximum transition accuracy. Some examples illustrate the various features of PILA.