2020-01-10
Welcome to the course. As explained at the first lecture, the details on how the course will be run are still being worked out.
The first lab will be held starting the week of January 13. To prepare you can take the "How to Efficiently Use the Oscilloscope" course (under Content / Labs) and review the XYZs of Oscilloscopes - Tektronix book (under Content / Supplementary Material).
Note that you will need to self-register in the course by following the instructions given under "Content / Labs" or you will get a permission error.
2020-01-13
The Lab 1 instructions have been posted. The only lab prep needed for this lab is to complete the on-line course on using the oscilloscope. You will need your ELEX 1117 CPLD board, some pin header jumper wires and a USB flash drive to do the lab.
2020-01-15
The instructions for Lab 2 have been posted. You will need to do a short (?) lab prep for this lab. You can do most of the lab on your own if you have Quartus installed.
2020-01-17
The ELEX 2117 parts kit apparently has 472 (4.7nF) instead of 473 (47nF) capacitors. The substitution was approved by the previous course instructor and should not affect your labs. Please do not ask the IEEE club about this.
2020-01-17
The proctor hours for the labs will start on Saturday, January 18. For SW1-3055 they will be Tuesdays from 6 to 9 PM and on Sunday from noon to 5 PM.
2020-01-22
The instructions for Lab 3 have been posted. The pre-lab requires that you write a solution in VHDL. You can do most of the lab on your own if you have Quartus installed.
2020-01-23
An interim course outline, including marking scheme, has been published. Most of it has been carried over from the previous term and is subject to change by the new instructor.
2020-01-27
The instructions for Lab 4 have been posted. As for Lab 3, the pre-lab requires that you write a solution in VHDL and you can do most of the lab on your own if you have Quartus installed.
2020-01-27
2020-02-03
I have posted the solutions to practice quiz 2 and (most of) the exercises in lecture 2 (HDL Idioms).
2020-02-05
The instructions for Lab 5 have been posted.
2020-02-07
This is the tentative course schedule. It is subject to change.
|
Day: |
Mon |
Tue |
Wed |
Thu |
Fri |
|
Lectures: |
|
12:30 |
|
9:30 |
1:30 |
|
Lab Sets: |
2D |
2E, 2A |
2B |
2C |
2F |
|
Jan 06 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 13 |
L1 |
L1 |
snow day |
L1 |
L1 |
|
Jan 20 |
L2 |
L2, Q1 |
L2 |
L2 |
L2 |
|
Jan 27 |
L3 |
L3 |
L3 |
L3 |
L3 |
|
Feb 03 |
L4a |
snow day |
L4a |
L4a |
L4a |
|
Feb 10 |
L4b |
L4a, Q2 |
L4b |
L4b |
L4b |
|
Feb 17 |
holiday |
L4b, Q3 |
L1 |
L5 |
L5 |
|
Feb 24 |
L5 |
L5 |
L5 |
MT1 |
MT1 |
|
Mar 02 |
LE1 |
LE1, Q4 |
LE1 |
LE1 |
LE1 |
|
Mar 09 |
break |
break |
break |
break |
break |
|
Mar 16 |
suspended |
suspended |
L6 |
L6 |
L6, WD(*) |
|
Mar 23 |
L6 |
L6 |
L7 |
L7 |
L7, Q5 |
|
Mar 30 |
L7 |
L7 |
L8 |
L8 |
L8 |
|
Apr 06 |
L8 |
L8 |
open lab |
exams |
holiday |
|
Apr 13 |
holiday |
exams |
exams |
exams |
exams |
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Ln=Lab n, Qn = Quiz n, Mtn=Midterm, LEn=Lab Exam |
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WD(*) = Withdrawal deadline. |
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2020-02-08
The ELEX 2117 VHDL Coding Guidelines are available. You must follow these starting with Lab 5.
2020-02-11
Some versions of Quartus do not allow special characters, including spaces, in the project path name. If you are using ShareFile (typically the H: drive), you may need to use a folder under ``Favorites.''
You may prefer to use a USB flash drive (typically E:). A USB3 drive will probably be faster since Quartus creates many small files. Remember to take the drive with you when you leave the lab.
You may also use a folder on the D: drive but you must remember to back up and delete the folder before leaving the lab. If you don't, then someone else may hand in your work and you will be penalized.
Do not use the C: drive, including the Desktop. Such files will be deleted when the computer reboots resulting in the loss of all of your work. This could be catastrophic during your lab exam.
2020-02-12
I've written up some hints for completing Lab 5 based on my observations of a few early attempts.
2020-02-20
Topics:
The question format and difficulty level will be similar to the quizzes.
The exam is open-book. Any printed material is allowed but all electronic devices (including cell phones and smart watches) except for calculators must be left at the side of the room.
You must write your own exam. Each exam will be different but all will be equally difficult.
2020-02-28
The lab exam instructions were posted Wednesday evening (see Content / Lab Exam).
It is strongly recommended that you read the instructions, configure and test your breadboard and do the first and second practice lab exams before your lab exam. To do this you will need to download the labexam.qar Quartus project archive file and practice uploading to the Practice Lab Exam VHDL File Assignment Folder.
2020-02-29
I've posted the solutions to the practice lab exams. You can also look at the solutions for Practice Quiz 3 and Quiz 3 if you need additional examples of how a state transition diagram can be converted to VHDL.
2020-03-03
Due to an error in printing Quiz 4, it will be held on Thursday, March 5. It will be a state machine design problem similar to Quiz 3.
We will also mark Quizzes 2 and 3.
2020-03-15
The lab notes for Lab 6 have been published along with a Quartus archive that will give you a head-start in completing the lab.
Due to the shift to on-line classes this lab may be completed on your own.
The lab notes describe what you need to submit to demonstrate completion of the lab.
2020-03-15
The marks for Quizzes 1-2, Labs 1-5, the Lab Exam and the Midterm Exam have been posted as has the marking scheme.
To retrieve your marks you'll need to enter your A0 BCIT ID and a password, unique to each student, which can be retrieved from the Grades link on the course web site.
Your final mark reflects only those items that have been marked which amount to about 52% of the total marks available.
Each quiz, lab and midterm exam has equal weight regardless of the number of marks. The lab and quiz marks assume zero for those that have not been marked.
2020-03-17
As you're probably aware, we will be moving to on-line learning for the remainder of the term starting on Wednesday, March 18.
For ELEX 2117 this means:
Because we are moving to fully on-line course delivery it is strongly recommended that you subscribe to notifications (on the News drop-down menu select "Notifications" and make sure at least "News - new item available" is selected and that your contact method information is accurate.)
2020-03-18
In order for me to return your marked quizzes, midterm and final exams, please submit an empty text file named null.txt to the Exam Return assignment folder as soon as possible. Scans of your marked exams will be returned as feedback files to this submission.
On Windows you can create an empty file by right-clicking on any empty folder (e.g. the Desktop), selecting New > Text Document and changing the name to null.
Unfortunately, Learning Hub will not accept empty files (!) so you'll need to edit the file and add some text (a couple of spaces will do).
2020-03-24
I've made a video showing how to use ModelSim to complete lab 7. It's available under Content > Labs > modelsimdemo.mp4.
2020-03-27
Quiz 5 has been marked and you should be able to see your answers. The average was 64% (worse than usual, perhaps due to insufficient time).
w/8 in addition to log2(w) were added as valid answers to the question on the number of byte-selects required for a memory of width w. This is because the question was somewhat ambiguous -- some systems decode the byte-select address lines into individual byte-select lines.
2020-03-29
The instructions for submitting documentation to get credit for completing a lab during the "open lab" have been posted to Content > Labs. Note that you can only submit one lab for additional credit and that no marks will be awarded for Pre-Labs other than for Lab 5. The deadline for submitting your documentation is April 8.
2020-03-29
BCIT Procedure 5403-PR1 specifies that course outlines will carry a formal disclaimer that "unforeseeable circumstances may necessitate the alterations of course content, sequencing, timing or evaluation and that, as much as is possible, students will be given adequate notice of any such changes". Such a disclaimer appears at the end of the ELEX 2117 course outline.
Due to concerns about the reliability of on-line evaluations, the evaluation of the course will be altered by changing the weights of the various components as shown in the following table:
| Old Weight | New Weight | |
| Labs | 15 | 21 |
| Lab Exam | 15 | 21 |
| Quizzes | 5 | 7 |
| Midterm | 25 | 36 |
| Final Exam | 40 | 15 |
| Total | 100 | 100 |
The final exam will only cover the material since the midterm break and will count for 15% of your final mark. The lower weighting of the final exam reflects the smaller fraction of material being covered and the expected lower reliability of on-line versus in-person exams. The weightings of the other components will be increased proportionately as shown above.
2020-03-30
The marks have been updated to reflect the new weighting. All marks have been entered except for Lab 8, the open lab and the final exam.
Scans of your midterm exams and quizzes 2 through 4 are available as feedback files in your Exam Return assignment folder. Quiz 5 results are available under Activities > Quizzes.
Please compare your marks to the marking scheme and let me know if you have any questions.
2020-04-04
I've added some hints for completing Lab 8 under Content > Labs.
2020-04-04
A feedback file has been added to the "Exam Return" assignment folder with a brief comment on why marks were deducted for Labs 6 and 7. The comments are blank if you did not submit the lab or if there were no errors. Let your lab instructor (Andrew or Ed) know if you have any questions.
2020-04-08
A practice final exam is available under Activities > Quizzes. The exam has 21 questions worth 26 points and has a time limit of 60 minutes. For this practice exam you will be shown your answers and the correct answers and you will be able to attempt it a second time. On the final exam you will not see your score until after everyone has finished and you will get only one attempt.
2020-04-08
In case you don't have a calculator that can do hex/decimal conversion (or even if you do and want a faster way to do these calculations), I've written a short description of how you can use your browser as a calculator (without accessing any web sites).
2020-04-09
Details on how your exam was marked should be available under:
Activities > Quizzes > (under the Evaluation Status column for Final Exam:) On Attempt > Attempt 1
Your final exam mark is available along with your other marks. The final exam mark is out of 35 (and the percentage is also calculated).
The average mark for the question "Which of the following interfaces requires the least logic to implement?" was only 14% (the correct answer is parallel) so I've re-graded the final exam to count the other answers (SPI and USB) as correct. This increased 14 students' marks by 1 point.
A histogram of the final exam marks is shown below:
2020-04-15
With the exception of three students being investigated for plagiarism, all items have now been marked. Please check your marks for omissions or errors and let me know if you have any questions.
Comments on Lab 8 are available as feedback in the Exam Return Assignment folder. The feedback will be blank if you did not submit Lab 8 (your mark is a blank) or if no marks were deducted (your mark is 5/5).
These are unofficial final marks and are subject to change.
The distribution of the final marks is shown below.
