ITC 2009: OptimalTest deepens test management offerings
New modules will offer a non-invasive interface to individual test stations.
Ron Wilson, EDN Executive Editor -- Test & Measurement World, 11/6/2009 2:09:15 PM
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OptimalTest, which claims to be the only supplier of enterprise-level test-optimization tools, announced three significant extensions to the company's suite of tester-monitoring and data-analysis tools at the International Test Conference (November 1–6) in Austin, TX. New modules will offer a non-invasive interface to individual test stations, a complete redesign of the user interface for creating rules, and greatly expanded capabilities for visualizing and analyzing test data.
The modules enhance Optimal Enterprise: a network that spans the test floor, a central database, and access points for test engineers and managers. The original configuration of Optimal Enterprise centers on a server, which supports a Sequel database and a software expert engine to execute the user-defined rules. Each test station on the floor then would have a personal computer that acts as an interface to the system, executing a module called OTBox. OTBox abstracts test data from the tester into a light XML format for transmission to the database, and also to a real-time viewing utility, OTControlRoom. In addition, OTBox gives the system a certain amount of control over the tester and its handling equipment, allowing Optimal Enterprise to influence workflow on the floor in real time in response to, for example, a statistical anomaly in a wafer lot, or as part of an adaptive test methodology.
The pieces of Optimal Enterprise then work together to monitor the progress of workflow on the test floor, accumulate the test data into a comprehensive database, evaluate user-defined rules against the database and initiate actions based on the results. All of this happens while onsite engineers have a real-time cockpit for watching workflow and rules evaluation. Each of the three new modules enhances these capabilities.
The first of the three modules, OTProxy, is an alternative to OTBox. "OTProxy is a light XML executable with about 70 percent of the capabilities of OTBox," said OptimalTest VP of sales and marketing Debbora Ahlgren. "The main difference is that OTProxy does not allow control of the tester."
The second new module, OTRules2, is a complete rewrite of the user interface for generating the rules the system uses to control workflow. The Rules module scans test data coming into the database, evaluates the rules based on the data, and generates both commands to the test floor and messages to test managers. For example, Rules might detect a pattern of consistent higher-than-expected fails only on a particular test on a particular site, and pull the tester in question offline to check for equipment failure.
OTRules2 changes the way users create rules. "Frankly, in the old system it could take a year to really master writing the rules," Ahlgren said. The new system is much quicker to learn, she claimed, and it provides a conditional-rule capability that allows application of a rule set only under specific conditions.
The third new module is OTPortal. Portal, another application on the local server, gives test engineers—potentially from off the test floor or even outside the test organization—access to Optimal Enterprise. Users can examine and deploy rules to the system remotely, apply statistical analyses to the database, and chart the results.
Portal gives users unprecedented access not only to data about their wafers and dice, but also about the test-floor operations. In cases where the user is in a fabless IC company or an IDM and the test floor belongs to a contractor of foundry, this can raise security concerns. "It's been interesting getting test contractors to allow this level of functionality in OTPortal," Ahlgren said. But by channeling the data through secure FTP servers, authenticating transactions, and encouraging customer IT departments to review the security provisions, Ahlgren said, OptimalTest has been able to reassure clients that the benefits far outweigh any chance of a security breach.
In a conference that dwelt heavily on design-for-test and test-methodology approaches to managing test cost, OptimalTest's announcement stands out as a reminder that even with the best methodology you still have to have efficient operations based on fresh data in order to manage test cost in the real world.
OptimalTest, www.optimaltest.com.
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