Teaching embedded system design is challenging, as the subject covers a wide range of aspects, and also involves skills that students do not learn from a text book. As a result, hands-on projects, with varying degree of complexity, are the most common approach in existing courses. Traditionally, the projects are limited to uni-processor systems, and do not address the complications involved in parallelising applications and mapping them to multi-processor systems.In this paper, we describe a two-year-old embedded systems design course given at Eindhoven University of Technology. In the course, groups of four students are faced with the problem of putting an embedded JPEG decoder on the market within one semester. The starting point is a decoder written in sequential C and an embedded multiprocessor system, running on an FPGA. We describe the ideas and organisation of the course, and give examples of what challenges the students, as well as the instructors, are faced with. We exemplify results and give suggestions to those wishing to teach embedded multi-processor programming elsewhere.

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Multi-processor programming in the embedded system curriculum

The Nexos Project is a joint effort at Marquette University (MU) and University of Buffalo (UB) to build curriculum materials and a supporting experimental laboratory for hands-on projects in embedded systems courses Our approach focuses on inexpensive, flexible, commodity embedded hardware, (the Linksys WRT54GL wireless router,) freely available development and debugging tools, and a fresh implementation of a classic operating system that is now ideal for embedded system exploration The prototype laboratory environment is being used in multiple courses at our respective Universities, with excellent results We report on the infrastructure we have developed, the goals and content of our initial course offerings at both schools, and an evaluation of our success thus far

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Nexos: a next generation embedded systems laboratory

This paper describes Marquette University's efforts to build an experimental embedded systems laboratory for hands-on projects in an introductory hardware systems course Our prototype laboratory is now serving as the basis for a coherent sequence of class projects threaded throughout subsequent courses in operating systems, networking, and embedded systems, among others We describe the major components of our laboratory environment, how it is used in our hardware systems course, and how this has contributed to significant improvements in other core courses in our curriculum

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An experimental laboratory environment for teaching embedded hardware systems

The input/output (I/O) subsystem is an important topic within computer architecture (CA) because it determines how the computer interacts with its environment. For this reason, computer scientists and engineers must understand how the computer manages this interaction, which is usually taught in introductory CA courses. Of course, there are many different styles of teaching, ranging from purely theoretical to completely practical. The CA course considered in this paper has already applied a practical approach for some time. For the I/O subsystem, students must be able to describe what polling and interrupts are and handle them through low-level programming. However, programming at this level in operating system (OS)-driven computers is not possible without being familiar with the kernel and drivers, which is not usually the case for students in an introductory course. Fortunately, there are many bare and specialized embedded systems around that are not OS-driven. In this proposal, the Nintendo DS (NDS) console was used in a classroom setting. It proved to be an appropriate infrastructure for developing attractive and engaging projects and was useful in providing a better understanding of the mechanisms related to the I/O subsystem. At the same time, the teaching methods were altered to make the transition from classical, passive, lecture-based classes to an active project-based learning (PBL) approach. It has been a very rewarding experience to see students learning to control the NDS devices on their own. In addition to describing the implementation of the proposed changes in two subsequent school years, this paper also presents some data and conclusions.

Game-Console-Based Projects for Learning the Computer Input/Output Subsystem

Embedded programming training today commonly involves numerous low-level details of a particular microcontroller. Such details shift focus away from higher-level structured embedded programming concepts. Thus, hard-to-break, unstructured programming habits are commonplace in the field. Yet structured embedded programming is becoming more necessary as embedded systems grow in complexity. We introduce a virtual microcontroller to address this problem. Freed from manufacturing or historical architectural issues, the virtual microcontroller contains the core features to support embedded programming training, and possesses an exceptionally clean interface to low-level features like timers, interrupt service routines, and UARTs. The virtual microcontroller can be mapped onto existing microcontrollers, or even onto FPGAs or a PC, providing more lab and book flexibility, at the expense of performance and size overhead. Most importantly, training can still use a bottom-up resource-aware approach, yet can focus more on structured embedded programming concepts.

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Virtual microcontrollers

At Northeastern University we are building a number of courses upon a common embedded systems platform. The goal is to reduce the learning curve associated with new architectures and programming environments. The platform selected is based on the Analog Devices Blackfin digital signal processor.In this paper we discuss our recent experience developing anew undergraduate embedded systems lab. Students learn to utilize the embedded DSP platform to address a number of different applications, including controller design, RS-232 communication, encryption, and image processing. This platform provides a rich design exploration sandbox replete with programming and simulation tools. We describe our use of this platform in our Microprocessor-based Design Laboratory and discuss how this platform can be used in a range of classes.

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Richard Platcow

Papers

Experiences with the Blackfin architecture in an embedded systems lab