What Changed in Your Design? Stop Guessing—Let Stylus Compare Show You

Introduction: When “Spot the Difference” Becomes a Design Bottleneck

Every digital design engineer has faced it—two databases, countless changes, and one critical question: what actually changed? Whether it’s a new ECO, a different tool version, or a late‑stage timing fix, manually tracking differences across runs can slow teams down and hide real issues.

Stylus compare was built to solve this problem. Covered in Cadence's customer education training, this powerful utility turns database comparison into an interactive, visual, and highly productive experience—directly inside Innovus and other back‑end tools.

Want to take a deep dive? Join our CadenceTECHTALK to identify the proven benefits of stylus compare.

CadenceTECHTALK: Stylus Compare - A Comprehensive Utility for Comparison of Common UI Databases Using Innovus and Other Back-End Tools

Why Stylus Compare Matters

Traditional diff tools weren’t designed for physical layouts, timing paths, or hierarchical databases. Stylus compare fills that gap by enabling real‑time comparison of two stylus databases, helping engineers quickly understand what changed, where it changed, and why it matters.

With support for Innovus, Tempus, Voltus, and mixed tool versions, stylus compare becomes a common cockpit for debug, ECO validation, and correlation analysis—without leaving your design environment.

What the Training Covers

This webinar walks through the benefits of stylus compare including:

Implementation and ECO Comparison

• Detect ECO changes in instances, routing, layers, and timing
• Modify designs and re‑compare in the same session

Physical and Connectivity Checks

• Floorplan, layers, nets, instances, cells, and multibit flops
• Visual markers and logs highlight differences instantly
• Support for post‑mask and base‑layer

Timing Correlation and Debug

• Side‑by‑side timing path comparison with merged reports
• Identify missing cells, resized logic, and RC differences

Hierarchical Design Support

• Compare block vs. top‑level designs in context and validate timing
• Support for master/clone hierarchies and 3D‑IC flows

Conclusion: Compare Smarter, Not Harder

Stylus compare transforms design comparison from a tedious task into a fast, visual, and repeatable workflow. By bringing physical, timing, and attribute comparisons into a single environment, it empowers engineers to focus on fixing issues—not finding them.

If your work involves frequent design iterations, ECOs, or tool correlations, stylus compare is no longer optional—it’s essential.