Abstract: An IC device is packaged for accelerated transient particle emission by doping the underfill thereof with a transient-particle-emitting material having a predetermined, substantially constant emission rate. The emission rate may be tunable. In one aspect, a radioactive adhesive composition is provided for bonding a semiconductor device to a chip carrier. The radioactive adhesive composition is made from a cured reaction product including a resin and a filler, and may be reworkable or non-reworkable. Either the resin or the filler, individually or both together as a mix, are doped substantially uniformly with the transient-particle-emitting material, thereby putting the transient-particle-emitting in close proximity with the IC to be tested. The underfill is formulated to have a stable chemistry, and the doped particles are encapsulated, so as to contain the emissions. Accelerated transient-particle-emission testing may then be performed on the IC in situ to provide accelerated detection of soft errors.

Abstract: A system and method for selection of development processes that require corrective action is presented. A process improvement lessons learned procedure classifies and assigns priority rankings to improvable development processes. A process improvement lessons learned procedure includes several stages of list expansions and reductions that consider the probability of poor use of resources, the probability of a process being ineffective, and the probability of a process causing schedule impacts. The probabilities are multiplied together to not only provide a list of continuous improvement possibilities a team addresses, but a continuous improvement priority ranking provides a team with the order in which resources should be applied to each improvable development process.

Abstract: A system includes a data processing core coupled to a system memory employing error correction code (ECC) circuitry. The core includes an indicator of when a correctable system memory error occurs and what address is associated with the error. A watchdog timer is instantiated on a system management device. Periodically, the timer prompts the management device to interrupt the processor and poll the error indicator to determine if a memory error has been detected. If an error is detected, the corresponding physical memory address is recorded. If a predetermined number of consecutive errors associated with a single memory address or range of addresses occurs, an alert is issued. In one embodiment, polling the error indicator is infrequent initially. As additional errors are detected, the polling frequency increases. At higher polling frequencies, the system may require a greater number of consecutive errors before taking additional action.