Introduction to Embedded Systems

EE319K, Unique: 16275, 16280, 16285, 16290
Semester: Spring 2012

Description

Embedded systems; machine language execution; assembly and C language programming; local variables and subroutines; input/output synchronization; analog to digital conversion and digital to analog conversion; debugging; and interrupts.
 

Overview

EE319K will continue the bottom-up educational approach, started in EE302 and EE306. The overall educational objective is to allow students to discover how the computer in-teracts with its environment. It will provide hands-on experiences of how an embedded system could be used to solve EE problems. The focus will be understanding and analy-sis rather than design. The analog to digital converter (ADC) and digital to analog con-verter (DAC) are the chosen mechanism to bridge the CE and EE worlds. EE concepts include Ohms Law, LED voltage/current, resistance measurement, and stepper motor control. CE concepts include I/O device drivers, debugging, stacks, FIFO queues, local variables and interrupts. The hardware construction is performed on a breadboard and debugged using a multimeter (students learn to measure voltage and resistance). Soft-ware is developed in Freescale 9S12 assembly and C; 3 out of the 10 labs are simu-lated-only in TExaS and the other 7 are first simulated in TExaS and then run on the real 9S12. Software debugging occurs during the simulation stage. Verification occurs in both stages. Labs 1 through 6 are written in 9S12 assembly language. Labs 8 and 9 are writ-ten in a combination of assembly and C. Labs 7 and 10 are written in a C.
 

Prerequisites

• EE306 or BME303 with a grade of at least C-.
  Things you should recall from EE306/BME303:
  1. Bits
     1. Numbers - Unsigned and Signed Integer representation in 2's Complement
     2. True/False - Logical Operations
     3. Characters - ASCII representation
  2. Gates
     1. AND, NAND, OR, NOR, NOT, XOR
     2. DeMorgan's Laws
  3. Computer Components
     1. Central Processing Unit: Arithmetic Logic Unit and Control Unit
        1. Registers
     2. Memory - ROM and RAM
        1. Address Space and Addressability
     3. I/O
  4. LC3 Assembly Language
     1. Instruction Set (ISA)
     2. Pseudo-ops
     3. Op-codes and Operands
        1. Memory operations
        2. Arithmetic and Logic operations
        3. Control operations - Branches/Jumps
     4. Addressing Modes
  5. Programming
     1. Algorithms, Flow-Charts
     2. Data Types
     3. Data Structures (Arrays and Linked Lists)
     4. Interrupts
     
      

Textbook

• Main textbook

  Jonathan W. Valvano Introduction to Embedded Systems: Interfacing to the Freescale 9S12 Cengage Publishing, 2009 ISBN-10: 049541137X / ISBN-13: 9780495411376 (authors' site) (list of known errors)

• Additional references
  • Reading assignments will be given from Patt's Introduction to Computing Systems (text-book for EE306 and BME303).
  • C programming book (C Primer) specific for the Metrowerks compiler and 9S12.
     

Objectives

After the successful conclusion of EE319K students should be able to understand the basic components of a computer, write assembly and C language programs that perform I/O functions and implement simple data structures, manipulate numbers in multiple formats, and understand how software uses global memory to store permanent information and the stack to store temporary information.

1. Understanding how the computer stores and manipulates data (characters, integers, and fixed-point numbers), the basic arithmetic and logical operations performed by the computer.
2. The understanding of embedded systems (a system with the computer hidden inside) using modular design and abstraction.
3. Assembly and C language programming: considering both function and style.
4. Understanding how the computer executes instructions (fetch opcode, fetch operand, read data, operate, and write data).
5. The use of a microcontroller (strategic use of RAM, ROM and I/O): microcontrollers typically have a little RAM and a lot of ROM; globals, locals and the heap go in RAM; constants and programs go in ROM.
6. Debugging and verification using a simulator and on the microcontroller (embedded systems typically do not have a print function); debugging using breakpoints, scanpoints, profiles, monitors, voltmeters, oscilloscopes, logic analyzers.
7. How input/output actually happens (the students wire up analog and digital signals to the 9S12 and measure them with a voltmeter), synchronization, including switches, LEDs, LCDs, DACs, ADCs, and serial ports.
8. The implementation of an I/O driver (a set of programs that perform I/O).
9. Understanding, from an architecture standpoint, how local variables and parameters work (e.g., space on the stack is dynamically created, the local variable is accessed using stack-pointer relative addressing, then the space is deallocated).
10. Analog to digital conversion (ADC), e.g., the students interface a slide potentiometer to the ADC and write software that measures the position of the slide, creating a display like "1.23 cm".
11. Interrupt synchronization, real-time ADC sampling (periodic timer interrupts), introduction to multithreaded programming.
12. Simple motors (e.g., open and closed-loop stepper motor control).
13. Digital to analog conversion (DAC), used to make simple sounds.
14. Design and implementation of elementary data structures, such as linked lists, stacks and queues.
     

Policies

• Grading
  • 10% Homework/programming assignments
  • 30% Lab assignments
  • 15% In-class exam 1
  • 20% In-lab exam 2
  • 25% Final

  There will be no re-tests, make-ups or incompletes.
   

• Attendance

  Students are expected to attend lectures. The book covers more information than the class, and we will use lectures to map our way through the book. If you miss class you may find it difficult to catch up.
   

• Lab Policies and Lab Partners

  See the EE319K lab manual.

  There will be a signup for lab checkout times. Lab partners need to be enrolled in the same lab section. Each student or team of students will have a specific checkout time during their lab section, which will be when their lab will be demonstrated to their TA. You can only switch lab sections using official add/drop procedures.
   

• Homework Assignments

  There will be approximately one homework assignment each week involving programming in assembly or C. Homeworks will be submitted online through Blackboard. You may work in groups and discuss homework problems with others, but every student has to independently develop his own, separate homework solution. Late homework submissions will not be accepted under any circumstances.
   

• Academic Dishonesty

  "Faculty in the ECE Department are committed to detecting and responding to all instances of scholastic dishonesty and will pursue cases of scholastic dishonesty in accordance with university policy. Scholastic dishonesty, in all its forms, is a blight on our entire academic community. All parties in our community -- faculty, staff, and students -- are responsible for creating an environment that educates outstanding engineers, and this goal entails excellence in technical skills, self-giving citizenry, an ethical integrity. Industry wants engineers who are competent and fully trustworthy, and both qualities must be developed day by day throughout an entire lifetime. Scholastic dishonesty includes, but is not limited to, cheating, plagiarism, collusion, falsifying academic records, or any act designed to give an unfair academic advantage to the student. The fact that you are in this class as an engineering student is testament to your abilities. Penalties for scholastic dishonesty are severe and can include, but are not limited to, a written reprimand, a zero on the assignment/exam, re-taking the exam in question, an F in the course, or expulsion from the University. Don't jeopardize your career by an act of scholastic dishonesty. Details about academic integrity and what constitutes scholastic dishonesty can be found at the website for the UT Dean of Students Office and the General Information Catalog, Section 11-802." 

  You are encouraged to study together and to discuss information and concepts with other students. You can give "consulting" help to or receive "consulting" help from such students in oral form. However, this permissible cooperation should never involve one student having possession of a copy of all or part of work done by someone else, in the form of an email, an email attachment file, a portable storage device, or a hard copy. Copying of any part of a program is cheating without explicit reference to its source. We do enter lab and homework assignments turned in by EE319K students through a plagiarism checker, comparing them to assignments of this and previous semesters. If we find two programs that are copied, there will be a substantial penalty to both students, e.g., failure in the course. Students who cheat on tests, homeworks or in lab will fail. Prosecution of cases is very traumatic to both the student and instructor. It is appropriate to use software out of the book, class website as long as all copy-pasted software is explicitly referenced. Copy-pasting software from current or past EE319K students is scholastic dishonesty.

  Policies concerning the use of other people's software in this class:

  • I strongly encourage you to study existing software.
  • All applications and libraries must be legally obtained. E.g.:
    • You may use libraries that came when you bought a compiler.
    • You may use software obtained from the web.
    • You may copy and paste from the existing source code.
  • You may use any existing source code that is clearly referenced and categorized:
    original: completely written by you,
    derived: fundamental approach is copied but it is your implementation,
    modified: source code significantly edited to serve your purpose,
    copied: source code includes minor modifications.
  
   
• University Honor Code

  "The core values of the University of Texas at Austin are learning, discovery, freedom, leadership, individual opportunity, and responsibility. Each member of the University is expected to uphold these values through integrity, honesty, trust, fairness, and respect toward peers and community." (see the university catalog)
   

• Add/Drop

  The 12th class day is Wednesday, February 1, 2012. The drop policy has recently changed. See your academic advisor or the Dean of Students for more information.
   

• Course Evaluations and Final Exam

  Course evaluation is conducted on the last class day in accordance with the Measurement and Evaluation Center form. The final exam is at the time and place stated in the course schedule.
   

Electronic Mail Notification Policy

In this course e-mail will be used as a means of communication with students. You will be responsible for checking your e-mail regularly for class work and announcements. The complete text of the University electronic mail notification policy and instructions for updating your e-mail address are available at http://www.utexas.edu/its/policies/emailnotify.html.
 

Use of Blackboard and Class Web Site

This course uses the class web page and Blackboard to distribute course materials, to communicate and collaborate online, to submit assignments and to post solutions and grades. You will be responsible for checking the class web page and the Blackboard course site regularly for class work and announcements. As with all computer systems, there are occasional scheduled downtimes as well as unanticipated disruptions. Notification of disruptions will be posted on the Blackboard login page. Scheduled downtimes are not an excuse for late work. However, if there is an unscheduled downtime for a significant period of time, I will make an adjustment if it occurs close to the due date.
 

Students with disabilities

The University of Texas at Austin provides upon request appropriate academic accommodations for qualified students with disabilities. For more information, contact the Office of the Dean of Students at 471-6259, 471-4641 TTY or the College of Engineering Director of Students with Disabilities at 471-4382.
 

Religious Holidays

Religious holy days sometimes conflict with class and examination schedules. If you miss an examination, work assignment, or other project due to the observance of a religious holy day you will be given an opportunity to complete the work missed within a reasonable time after the absence. It is the policy of The University of Texas at Austin that you must notify each of your instructors at least fourteen days prior to the classes scheduled on dates you will be absent to observe a religious holy day.