Summer 2024 EEL3701C student:
Welcome to EEL3701: Digital Logic and Computer Systems. I'm Dr. Schwartz, the course instructor. 3701 is a very important course, and one that I hope that you find very interesting. Please read this ENTIRE email carefully to be sure that you understand some of the important aspects of this course.
The course
lectures and labs will be ENTIRELY synchronous and
in-person. This means that your lectures and labs will occur at
the times specified when you registered. Nothing will be Zoomed
this semester, other than our practicals and exams (and some
office hours). The
practicals and exams will also use Honorlock, as will our lab
quizzes.
Since practicals and exams will be administered remotely, all students will need a functioning webcam with microphone, and relatively high speed and stable internet connection (minimum upload and download bandwidths of 2 Mpbs) through which you can participate. If you don’t have the bandwidth or any of this hardware, you must secure these in order to participate in the course. (Note that neither headphones nor earbuds are allowed during Honorlock administered assignments.) You will also need a smartphone with which you can scan documents to submit for the course, both for labs and during practicals and exams.
You will receive SOME items for yours labs during your first lab (Lab 0), starting Monday, May 20th. There will be no labs before May 20th.
There is NO
NEED to buy a NEW textbook, but access to a
textbook IS required. This link
will provide info with some textbook purchasing options. You can
share a used book with a couple of others students, rent a
textbook, or rent an electronic version of the textbook. An
enhanced 7th edition has been available for a few years now. It
is not necessary, as even the 5th edition of
this textbook will meet our purposes. The textbook will NOT
be needed during the first week of classes.
If you do NOT already own an Diligent Analog Discovery (DAD), good news! The ECE department will supply you with a DAD-3 to use at no cost to you! You will not own this DAD, but will be borrowing it from ECE. ECE and CpE students will need to return it just prior to their BS graduation; students with other majors will need to return it at the end of the semester. A DAD is required for this course (and many other ECE courses); it will be used in most labs and during two of our (practical) exams. (If you already own a DAD, any working version of the DAD is okay, including the original versions, the DAD-1 and DAD-2.) Students in the course cannot share the devices, since everyone will need their own during two of our (practical) exams.
Students will also be given a DE10-lite PLD PCB. All students will
return the DE10-lite at the end of the semester. Students will
need to PURCHASE additional parts ASAP. These
miscellaneous components will be used in our labs and practicals
and are required. The items that you need to purchase are listed
on page two of the syllabus at https://mil.ufl.edu/3701/admin/syl_u24.pdf.
A local company, OOTB Electronics and Robotics, can
provide most of the parts (OOTB EEL 3701 Accessory Kit) and I
recommend an online company (Jameco) for the other parts (Jameco Part #: 20774 and Jameco Part #: 19290). I strongly
suggest that you buy the part OOTB EEL 3701 Accessory Kit; if you
do, you can pick them up at the end of class on Thursday, May
16th, in our classroom. Otherwise, you will have to go to the OOTB
store at 4639 NW 6th St, Suite G.
Also, each student will need their own laptop PC for use for use in some lectures, and all labs, and during our practicals and exams. It must be capable of running Windows software. If necessary, this may mean installing a virtual machine on Mac or Linux computers.
One of the devices that we use requires a USB type A port and the
other a USB type C port on your computer. If your laptop does not
have these two USB ports (one for the DE10-lite PLD and one for
your DAD), then you will need to buy a USB Port Expander
(generally, $7 to $15) or USB type converters. Details of what
might be needed is at the end of this email (under USB
Requirements).
A preliminary syllabus is now posted; I'll continue to update it when I get new information. Our website is www.mil.ufl.edu/3701/; the website will be used to distribute documents for our course. We will also use Canvas (https://ufl.instructure.com/) for course submissions and raw grade posting.
Note that 3701 is a rigorous and time-intensive course. It
requires consistent effort. But if you put in the effort,
you will not only be successful in the course, but you will likely
come to find that it was one of the most impactful courses that
you ever took!
Our class has a Slack channel, eel3701.slack.com. I will **REGULARLY**
post announcements to this account. I will NOT
generally email announcements; I only send them via slack. Use
this
invitation link to get signed up. Getting slack messages in
this course is VERY important. Previously, when I was using
twitter instead of slack, I sent a hint about three hours previous
to an exam and several students told me that they never saw it!
All the best,
Dr. SchwarzEEL3701C instructor, Summer 2024
P.S. Action items:
- Purchase the OOTB EEL 3701 Accessory Kit; pick it up at the store or from our classroom on Thur, May 16th.
- Purchase a breadboard and wire kit. I suggest Jameco Part #: 20774 and Jameco Part #: 19290, respectively.
- If necessary, buy an appropriate USB port expander and/or
USB converter and/or USB cable.
- Get access to a textbook, hopefully by finding a cheap used
one for yourself or that you can share.
P.P.S. For CSE or CSC students: EEL3701C is no longer
required (i.e., there are other options) for either of these
majors. I believe that 3701 is an excellent course and extremely
valuable to both CSE and CSC majors, but it is a rigorous
and time-intensive course.
P.P.P.S. If any of your friends might be interested in taking 3701, please encourage them to do so. There are still some available spaces left and more MIGHT be added if more students get on the waiting list. I regularly have students who graduated from UF tell me about how critical this course was for them.
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USB requirements:
You will get two USB connected items for our labs. The DE10-lite
comes with a type A male to type B male USB cable (with the type B
male USB side plugged into the DE10-lite and the type A male side
plugged into the USB computer port). The new DAD-3 has a
USB-C cable (male to male). (Older DADs [DAD-1 and DAD-2] have
USB-A connection to the PC.)
One solutions, if you have a shortage or the wrong kind of USB
ports, is to get a USB hub like one of those below.
Alternatively, if you have two USB C ports on there computer, you
could get one of the below adapters for the DE10-lite
or you could get a new a USB C to USB A cable (below).
If you have two USB A ports on your computers, you could get one
of the below adapters for the DAD-3
or a new a USB A to USB B cable (below).
If you are unsure, please bring your laptop to a PI during office
hours and they will help you decide the best solution.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Dr. Eric M. Schwartz Phone: (352) 392-2541 Director, Machine Intel. Lab (MIL) e-mail: ems@ufl.edu Master Lecturer/Instructional Professor http://mil.ufl.edu/ems/ Dept. of Elec. & Comp. Engineering 1889 Museum Rd Director, NaviGator AMS Project Malachowsky Hall #3110 Director, SubjuGator AUV Project Gainesville, FL 32611 Director, PropaGator ASV Project Faculty Advisor, IEEE UF Student Branch Chair, IEEE Gainesville Section University of Florida MIL Location: 3001 MALA -------------------------------------------------------------------