ECE 3362- 001, ECE 3362-002 Digital Design Using Micro-Controllers Fall 2014

ECE3362-001 MWF 10:00 - 10:50 am, Room: EE 222

ECE3362-002 TuTh 12:30 - 1:50 pm, Room: EE 118



Catalog Data: ECE 3362: Digital Design Using Microcontrollers (3:3:0).Prerequisite: ECE 1305, ECE 2372. Advanced digital
systems design. Assembly language programming, interfacing, and applications of microcontrollers.

Textbook: MSP430 Microcontroller Basics, John H. Davis, Elsevier, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-7506-8276-3.

Reference: Datasheets and examples will be posted on Blackboard

Instructor: Dr. Michael Helm, michael.helm@ttu.edu Office: EE 210
Class webpage: via Blackboard
Office Hours: TBD, will be provided later


Objectives/Outcomes: Upon completion of this course students should be able to analyze and design both hardware and
software aspects of digital systems using microprocessors and microcontrollers. The students will be able
to write and debug assembly language programs. The students will be able to analyze and design systems
with real-time control.

Prerequisites by topic: 1. Combinational logic design, Boolean Algebra
2. SSI, MSI, and LSI circuits and applications
3. Sequential machine fundamentals

Topics: 1. Micro-Controllers versus hard-wired logic
2. Mathematics of computers and elementary computer operations
3. Introduction to the MSP430 Micro-Controller Family
4. LaunchPad (Evaluation Board) familiarization
5. Input/output using ports of the MSP430
6. Transfer, arithmetic and logic instructions
7. Branches, stacks, and subroutines
8. Execution speed and Real-Time Control
9. Assemblers and simulators
10. Hardware configuration, resets and interrupts
11. Timing and Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) system
12. Use of Analog to Digital system
13. Function and use of the Serial communication systems
14. Tests and reviews

Projects: Several programming projects that will use the LaunchPad bd and Experimenters bd will be assigned.

Grading: Quizzes/homework: 10 %
Programming Projects: 35 %
Exams 55 %


Attendance: Is expected. Students are responsible for all material and assignments covered during class time, including any
quizzes. Quizzes are generally not announced in advance and may occur at the very beginning of class. Late arrivals forfeit the
right to take quizzes. University policy provides for certain excused absences for specific reasons.

Important Note
There will be no make-ups for exams. Projects and homework will not be accepted after the due date and time. Start early on
your projects to avoid problems. There will be a single one-time optional replacement project at the end of the semester which
can replace exactly one earlier project grade.

Academic Integrity is required. Turning in project assignments which are clearly directly plagiarized from another student will
result in a zero grade for that assignment for all students involved and repetition of such activity can and will result in F grade for the
class.


Contributions to professional component:

This course prepares students for engineering practice through design experiences in the classroom. This course also
includes further experience in algorithms, computer hardware and assembly language programming. This course includes
engineering topics and engineering design.

Expected Learning Outcomes: Upon completion of this course, the students will be able to:

1. Analyze and design microcontroller based systems.
2. Understand the engineering tradeoffs between HW and SW in a microcontroller based system.
3. Understand different types of microprocessor and microcontroller architectures.
4. Be able to demonstrate SW control of timing, and use of interrupt based designs.
5. Be able to demonstrate manipulation of registers, memory, and I/O in a microcontroller.

Methods of Assessment of Learning Outcomes

Multiple student projects using the Development Boards. Written exams and quizzes.

Expected schedule for MWF section, TuTh section will cover same material during same week, TuTh classes will have exams on Thursdays
(specific dates and topics subject to change)

Aug 25 M Intro to microcontrollers, dedicated HW vs uC, embedded systems
Aug 27 W Microcontroller model vs Microprocessor, Harvard vs von Neumann architecture
Aug 29 F Program Counter, Fetch-Decode-Execute process, register operations, register set, simple register operations

Sep 1 M Class Holiday Labor Day
Sep 3 W PORT concept in uC, I/O, direction control, sink/source limits, intro to Assembly Language
Sep 5 F Memory Map and use of SW simulator and IDE, basic Input/Output (I/O), simple addressing modes

Sep 8 M Structure of an Assembly Language program and simple Add, Subtract, and data manipulation
Sep 10 W Memory access methods and addressing methods, pointers Last Drop Day with no academic penalty
Sep 12 F Loops and conditional instructions

Sep 15 M Overflow and underflow, limits of 16 bit registers, 2s comp and unsigned ops, shift operations, Boolean Logic
operations, status register and its flags
Sep 17 W Subroutines and operation of the stack, RAM variables and debugging
Sep 19 F Stack Pointer, and stack operations

Sep 22 M Advanced simulation, debugging, and other IDE topics
Sep 24 W MIDTERM EXAM
Sep 26 F Bit Test and Bit Set/Clear instructions

Sep 29 M Advanced Digital I/O and SW based timing loops, executions times
Oct 1 W Arrays and other table based memory structures
Oct 3 F More table structures and arrays, pointer and indexed pointer addressing, advanced table structures

Oct 6 M Multiplexing
Oct 8 W Analog to Digital Converter, sensors, polling based approach
Oct 10 F Analog to Digital (A/D) converter

Oct 13 M Analog to Digital (A/D) converter
Oct 15 W Interrupts
Oct 17 F Interrupts

Oct 20 M Interrupt driven SW design
Oct 22 W MIDTERM EXAM
Oct 24 F Timers



Oct 27 M Timers Last Drop Day
Oct 29 W Timers
Oct 31 F Clocks

Nov 3 M Interrupts for real-time operation
Nov 5 W Simple serial communications
Nov 7 F Advanced serial communications

Nov 10 M PWM
Nov 12 W Use of C language
Nov 14 F Use of C language

Nov 17 M Use of C language
Nov 19 W Use of C language
Nov 21 F MIDTERM EXAM

Nov 24 M Advanced Topics
Nov 26 W No class
Nov 28 F No class

Dec 1 M Advanced Topics
Dec 3 W Last class day, Wrapup of final topics

Dec 6 S Final Exam (comprehensive) Section -002 (12:30 pm TuTh section): Saturday Dec 6th, 1:30 pm to 4:00 pm
Dec 9 T Final Exam (comprehensive) Section -001 (10:00 pm MWF section): Tuesday Dec 9th, 7:30 am to 10:00 am


Students with disabilities

Any student who, because of a disability, may require special arrangements in order to meet the course requirements should
contact the instructor as soon as possible to make any necessary arrangements. Students should present appropriate verification
from Student Disability Services during the instructors office hours. Please note instructors are not allowed to provide classroom
accommodations to a student until appropriate verification from Student Disability Services has been provided. For additional
information, you may contact the Student Disability Services office at 335 West Hall or 806-742-2405. I would appreciate hearing
from anyone who has a disability that may require special accommodations. I am sure we can work out whatever arrangements are
necessary. Please see me during my office hours.

Exam and Quiz Policy

Quizzes and Exams including the final exam are of limited time duration. Once you have started a quiz or exam, if you leave the
room for any reason you have forfeited all rights to continue work on the exam. No use of computers or cell phones or any other
mechanism supporting communication with other parties are allowed during the exam. This policy will be strictly enforced!


Programming Projects

There will be several projects during the semester. Each of these is an individual project. Students are welcome to make use of the
example programs provided by the instructor, but if such material is used directly or with only minor modifications it must be
referenced and attributed to the original source in the program header. Failure to do so will result in a grade penalty. Once some
basic foundations have been established, projects will begin at the rate of about one every 2 weeks, typically about 6 or 7 projects
per semester with one optional one-time replacement project in case of a missed project or low grade project. Projects are graded
aggressively for functionality, structure, header, comments, and correct filename format. Projects which wont assemble or compile
as turned in will receive a grade of zero. Projects which have no functionality will receive a grade of zero.