Much effort in hardware/software co-design has been devoted to developing `push-button' types of tools for automatic hardware/software partitioning. However, given the highly complex nature of embedded system design, user guided design exploration can be more effective. In this paper, we propose a framework for designer assisted partitioning that can be used in conjunction with any given search strategy. A key component of this framework is the visualization of the design space, without enumerating all possible design configurations. Furthermore, this design space representation provides a straightforward way for a designer to identify promising partitions and hence guide the subsequent exploration process. Experiments have shown the effectiveness of this approach.
