Replacing DSPF sub-circuits with their functional view in the Hierarchical Editor for an AMS Mixed-Signal Simulation

Hello Everyone,

I'm trying to optimise our design flow by better utilizing AMS simulation capabilities to decrease our simulation times. We work with Analog-On-Top and have smaller digital blocks in our analog blocks (config, pattern generators, etc...). I figured out how to this with schematic simulation or hierarchical av_extraced views. In both cases the individual blocks are discovered by the Hierarchical Editor and I can select in which way I want to simulate them (functional, schematic or av_extracted).

However our main workflow is DSPF based and I cannot get it working in such a way, that the Hierarchical Editor can detect the sub-block hierarchy in the hierarchical DSPF file. When I switch the top level block to DSPF and reload, all sub-blocks in the tree list disappear. I tried reading in the DSPF directly from the Hierarchical Editor menu and loading it as a DSPF cell view. The DSPF is hierarchical and has all the sub-blocks I care about defined as sub-circuits. I am using Calibre v2024.4_27.13, Quantus 24.1.0-p089 and Virtuoso IC23.1-64b.ISR17.40.

Is the av_extracted AMS Hierarchical Editor flow with a DSPF possible at all? If it's doable what could be the problem? If not what would be the correct approach? I also saw the documentation about DSPF-in-the-Middle (DSPFIM). Should this be used with DSPFs instead of the Hierarchical Editor?

I've also tried looking into IDSPF, but it seems like a hierarchical extraction is not possible in that format. 

Thank you very much for your support.

Best,
Josch