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Pva Build Test

NVIDIAOfficialCreated by Venkat BalanDistributed by NVIDIA

  • Skill
  • Workflow
  • Software development
  • Apache-2.0
  • Medium risk

From the author

Build and verify an NVIDIA PVA operator with the public PVA SDK. Use alone or from OpGen. Run optional EMU correctness, a fresh L4T build with the NVVPU or ASIP/Chess backend that Doctor proved, direct-SSH Tegra hardware correctness, and optional hardware performance. Return PASSED, FAILED, or BLOCKED with exact evidence.
— the description by Venkat Balan

AutoGineer summary

Written by AutoGineer from the skill’s own files, not by the author

The pva-build-test skill provides a structured procedure to build and verify NVIDIA PVA operators. It manages the end-to-end process of compiling source code, running emulator-based correctness checks, deploying to a connected Tegra device via SSH, and executing hardware-level system tests. The skill enforces strict input validation, requires documented references from a Doctor report, and produces detailed evidence-based reports in both Markdown and JSON formats.

What it does

  • Validates input configurations and SDK references against a Doctor report.
  • Performs emulator-based correctness testing for PVA operators.
  • Compiles operators for L4T using specified NVVPU or ASIP/Chess backends.
  • Deploys and executes system tests on target Tegra hardware via direct SSH.
  • Collects and reports performance metrics when requested.
  • Generates comprehensive build and test logs with verifiable evidence.

When to use it

  • When you need to verify the correctness of a PVA operator build.
  • When you require automated testing on physical Tegra hardware.
  • When integrating operator verification into an OpGen workflow.
  • When you need to generate standardized evidence reports for PVA operator builds.

Advantages

  • Ensures consistent verification by requiring Doctor-approved references.
  • Automates the transition from emulator testing to hardware deployment.
  • Provides clear, evidence-based verdicts of PASSED, FAILED, or BLOCKED.
  • Maintains strict separation between build, test, and deployment stages.

Usage examples

“Run pva-build-test for operator my_op with correctness-only scope.”
The agent validates the environment, builds the operator, runs the emulator and hardware tests, and generates a report confirming the operator's correctness.
“Execute pva-build-test with correctness-and-performance for my_op.”
The agent performs the full build and hardware test suite, collects performance profiling data, and includes the results in the final report.

Install

  1. Download the skill as a ZIP:

    https://autogineer.com/agent-skills/nvidia/pva-build-test/download
  2. Unzip it into the cross-client skills folder of your project:

    mkdir -p .agents/skills && unzip pva-build-test.zip -d .agents/skills

Documentation by Venkat Balan

<!-- SPDX-FileCopyrightText: Copyright (c) 2026 NVIDIA CORPORATION & AFFILIATES. All rights reserved. -->

Build and test a PVA operator

Build the current source. Test it on a directly connected Tegra. Do not change source code, expected results, or tolerances.

Build-Test owns verification stages, evidence, and verdicts.

Resolve paths

SKILL_ROOT is the absolute directory containing this skill's SKILL.md, after resolving symlinks. Bundled files are relative to that directory. Resolve supplied relative paths against the invocation directory before changing directories. PROJECT_ROOT is the active source workspace; RESULT_DIR is the caller's result directory. All build directories, reports, logs, and manifests below are under RESULT_DIR, not the shell's CWD.

Get the inputs

Require these inputs for all scopes:

  • Caller identity: OpGen for an OpGen call; otherwise the direct user.

  • A Doctor report that is ready for build-test, or accepted limitations.

  • Absolute project (PROJECT_ROOT) and result (RESULT_DIR) paths.

  • Operator name and PVA generation.

  • Test scope: correctness-only or correctness-and-performance.

  • Report label. Use build-test when none is supplied.

  • SDK version, safety variant, and Doctor's proved compiler backend.

  • EMU policy; when EMU execution is available or required, Doctor's proved EMU build mode and configure options, plus test commands.

  • L4T configure command and hardware system-test target and filter.

  • Correctness cases, independent references, and tolerances.

  • Complete install target or deployment manifest.

  • Tegra address, user, port, and persistent known-hosts file.

For correctness-and-performance, also require:

  • KPI or profiling target and case filter.

  • Profiling method, metric, warm-up count, and at least 1000 samples.

  • User-approved clock and clock-verification commands.

  • Expected clock values and target power mode.

  • Performance target and acceptance rule when the caller requests a comparison.

Do not require a KPI target, profiling artifact, clock input, sample count, or performance filter for correctness-only.

Do not guess a command, target account, filter, expected result, clock setting, or acceptance rule.

Verify the inputs and references

Require Doctor's public-reference-corpus check to be PASS. Set SDK_REFERENCES to the report's absolute sdk_reference_root. Require a readable index.md and reference-lock.json, a lock SHA-256 matching the report's sdk_reference_lock_sha256, and the reported SDK version matching this task. If these fields are absent or no longer match, return BLOCKED and request a fresh Doctor report. Do not fall back to an installed package or CWD path. Read the pva-build-test route in $SDK_REFERENCES/index.md. Before reading Markdown, check its SHA-256 against the lock outputs entry; return BLOCKED on a mismatch. Resolve links relative to each generated file. Use rg to select relevant build, compiler, deployment, signing, EMU, and profiling Markdown.

Read the direct-SSH procedure before target access. Fill the JSON result template using the result rules, then write the Markdown report from the same values.

Validate:

  • Absolute and readable project paths and a writable result path.

  • At least one correctness case with an independent expected result.

  • Unambiguous build, test, deployment, and target commands.

  • At least one matching hardware system test.

  • Performance inputs only when performance is in scope.

  • PVA generation, SDK runtime, and safety-variant consistency.

Return BLOCKED for a missing or ambiguous required input.

For each product fact, record the SDK documentation root, local Markdown path, packaged source path, source SHA-256, version, and section or PDF page.

Protect evidence

Before the build:

  1. Create new build directories under the result directory.

  2. Write source-manifest-before.sha256 with paths relative to the project root. Exclude new build and result directories.

  3. Record Git identity and dirty state when Git metadata exists.

  4. Record each command, exit code, log, and principal artifact hash.

Do not reuse a build, log, target result, or profile from an earlier source state.

Run the stages

Run these stages in order:

StageRequired action
InputValidate inputs, source identity, references, and scope.
EMU buildIf EMU is available or required, create a fresh build using Doctor's proved EMU mode and configure options. Otherwise record SKIPPED_OPTIONAL.
EMU testRun the approved EMU cases. Stop with FAILED on a demonstrated source or result defect.
L4T buildCreate a fresh release build with PVA_BUILD_MODE=L4T, the requested generation, PVA_DISASSEMBLE=ON, and Doctor's proved NVVPU or ASIP/Chess backend.
ListingRecord and inspect the generated compiler listing. Confirm vectorization in the main data path.
Target probeUse the direct-SSH procedure. Confirm Arm64, BSP, runtime version, safety variant, libraries, and required permissions.
DeployStage and transfer an explicit archive. Check dynamic dependencies on the target.
Hardware testList and run the filtered system tests for the complete correctness matrix.
PerformanceRun only for correctness-and-performance, after hardware correctness passes.
FreshnessHash the final source and compare it with the initial manifest.
EMU rules

Use PVA_BUILD_MODE=EMU with Doctor's proved SDK, generation, compiler, and other EMU configure options. Keep the L4T compiler selection separate. Replace the probe's source and build paths with PROJECT_ROOT and a new directory under RESULT_DIR; use the project's supplied test targets. Record the selected mode and options in emulator and the full command in commands.log. Return BLOCKED if an available or required EMU backend lacks this evidence or its settings conflict with the requested SDK or generation. Do not substitute another host execution tool for EMU.

With policy optional, an unavailable EMU component is SKIPPED_OPTIONAL. An EMU stage that starts and shows a source, build, or result defect is FAILED.

With policy required, an unavailable EMU component is BLOCKED.

EMU execution is an early correctness aid. It is not hardware evidence.

Run the same approved correctness cases, inputs, references, and tolerances on EMU and hardware when EMU runs. Do not reduce the EMU matrix because it is slow. Record the case IDs and counts for both environments.

L4T and compiler rules

Build the hardware system-test executable for both scopes. Build the KPI or profiling executable only for correctness-and-performance.

Accept the NVVPU or ASIP/Chess backend that Doctor proved. Do not require an ASIP path or Synopsys license when NVVPU is selected. Return BLOCKED if the proved backend is no longer usable. Return FAILED when current source causes the build to fail.

Require the compiler listing after a successful build. Record its path, hash, generation, entry point, main vector operations, address-generation evidence, spills, warnings, and scheduling facts that affect correctness. Return FAILED if the main data path is not vectorized.

Deployment rules

Use a project install target when it creates a complete deployment tree. Otherwise, use the supplied manifest.

Always include the hardware system-test executable, project libraries, device data, and test assets. Include the KPI or profiling executable and its assets only for correctness-and-performance.

Do not copy host-architecture libraries. Retain the remote directory unless the user asks for its removal.

Hardware correctness rules

Run --gtest_list_tests with the approved filter. Reject a zero-match filter. Then run the same filtered system-test executable.

For each case, record the input shape, format, pitch, parameters, independent reference, tolerance, exit code, comparison, and maximum error when relevant.

Return FAILED if the process, command status, output, case coverage, or tolerance check fails. Do not use a KPI-binary pass as correctness evidence.

Performance rules

Skip this stage for correctness-only.

For correctness-and-performance:

  1. Run the approved clock command and verify clocks and power mode.

  2. Run warm-ups separately.

  3. Collect at least 1000 hardware samples with the approved public profiling method.

  4. Verify clocks and power mode again.

  5. Record the metric, unit, workload, warm-ups, samples, minimum, maximum, mean, median, target conditions, and raw data path.

  6. Compare with a target only when the caller supplied a target and acceptance rule.

Do not use EMU time, host wall time, or total test duration as PVA execution time. Do not derive a target from the implementation under test.

A missed target is FAILED only when the acceptance rule makes it required.

Decide the verdict

  • PASSED: Every stage required by the selected scope passed for the current source. An optional EMU stage can be SKIPPED_OPTIONAL.

  • FAILED: A stage ran and produced a negative source, build, correctness, vectorization, or required performance result.

  • BLOCKED: A required stage could not run because an external input, dependency, permission, corpus, or target was unavailable.

Do not return PASSED from evidence for another source state. Do not change BLOCKED to PASSED because EMU tests passed.

Write the outputs

Always write:

  • reports/<report-label>.md

  • reports/<report-label>.json

  • source-manifest-before.sha256

  • source-manifest.sha256

  • source-identity.txt

  • commands.log

Write stage logs and artifact hashes only for stages that run. For correctness-only, do not require clock, profile, KPI, or raw performance files. If work stops early, mark later stages NOT_RUN and name the exact failed or blocked stage.

Do not remove raw evidence or replace it with a summary.

Return control

Return the verdict and absolute report paths to the caller. When called by OpGen, continue the existing OpGen workflow before ending the overall run: FAILED with remaining attempts goes to Debug; zero or exhausted attempts go to OpGen's final FAILED report. PASSED and BLOCKED also require OpGen's final report. Do not reinvoke OpGen or end with only a Build-Test response.

Files

LICENSE

Copyright (c) 2026 NVIDIA CORPORATION & AFFILIATES. All rights reserved.


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Requirements and compatibility

Works with: Claude Code, Claude apps, OpenAI Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Gemini CLI, Kiro, OpenCode, Goose, Amp, Roo Code, JetBrains Junie, Factory Droid, Devin (ex-Windsurf), Mistral Vibe, OpenHands, Letta

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Attribution and licence

Created by
Venkat Balan
Publisher
NVIDIA (Official)
Distributed by
NVIDIA
Source
NVIDIA/skills · skills/pva-build-test · commit fce3cca
Licence
Apache License 2.0 (redistribution allowed)
  • LICENSE (added by AutoGineer from LICENSE-APACHE)
  • ATTRIBUTION.md (written by AutoGineer)
Synced

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