News

Welcome to ELEX 2117. Our first lecture will be on Wednesday, September 4.

Labs will begin the week of September 9. Parts kits for the labs will be available for purchase from the BCIT bookstore for $6.95. These are only available to students registered in the course -- you will need to ask for the "ELEX 2117 Parts Kit" at the front counter and show ID. You will also need some components from your Level 1 parts kit (the EPM240 CPLD board, USB-Blaster, Dupont/Berg jumper wires, and some space on your breadboard).

Course Schedule

New Survey

Available under Activities->Surveys for Sets B, C, & D.
(Last date to complete: Sept 30th.)

Quartus Version 23.1 on AppsAnywhere

The installation of Quartus version 23.1 has been fixed and you should be able to use it for your labs.

Version 23.1 was incorrectly installed using the USB-Blaster drivers from Version 23.1. Thus it does not recognize the USB Blaster (or will fail to program it). Please use version 21.1 until this is corrected.

Proctored Lab Dates and Times

Quiz 1 Results

Quiz 1 has been marked and returned by email. The distribution of the marks is shown below:

Peer Tutoring

This Fall we have the following tutors from the School of Energy. Tutoring take place at the Burnaby library.

Peer tutors are students who have excelled in their studies and completed at least 2 terms. They are available to help their fellow students with reviewing course content, assisting with specific questions, and providing advice on study skills that helped them succeed in their courses. As always, this is free for current BCIT students and operates on a drop-in basis, so no registration or appointments are required. The full tutoring schedule is available on the Learning Commons webpage here.

Writing tutoring is available. Writing tutors are able to provide feedback on drafts or final work, and can also help brainstorm approaches to research and pre-planning written work. We have live in-person writing tutors at the Burnaby library on Mondays / Wednesdays / Thursdays. In addition to this, BCIT is a member of WriteAway – a 24/7 asynchronous writing tutoring service where the student can submit a written assignment at www.writeaway.ca and receive feedback via email from a tutor a day or so later. Again, these services are free for current BCIT students.

Finally, we have 2 faculty members (myself and Mark Williams) who provide study skills support. These are broader academic skills such as time management, exam preparation, and active learning strategies. Students can book individual appointments with us or come to one of our faculty-led drop-in sessions on Tuesdays at the DTC (second floor 11am – 1pm) or Wednesdays at the Burnaby library (2.30 – 4.30). Mark and I are also available to visit classes or lead in-class sessions on any study skills or writing topics the instructor thinks useful. Instructors or departments can email me directly to set up an in-class visit.

Midterm Exam 1

The first midterm exam will be held on Friday, October 4 from 3:30 to 5:20 PM in SW1-1021. Note that this is not at the regular lecture time.

The exam will be open-book but all electronic devices other than calculators must be left at side, back, or front of the room. Please wait outside the classroom (SW01-1021) until I ask you to come in. This will allow me to put out the exam papers in alphabetical order. Each exam will have a different version of each question. You must write your own exam at the location where it is placed.

Although the exam is scheduled for 110 minutes, the room is booked until 6:20 and you may continue writing later if you wish. However, it should be possible to complete the exam in about an hour.

Note that you may not leave for the first 30 minutes and you may not start the exam if you arrive after the first student has left.

Midterm 1 Resuts

The first midterm exam has been marked and returned. The median was 13/17. The distribution of the marks is shown below.

Quiz 2

Quiz 2 will be held on Wednesday, October 16 during the regular lecture time (from 9:30 to 10:20 AM) in SW1-1025. The quiz may include questions covering Verilog and the design of state machines (Lectures 1 through 3).

The quiz will be open-book but all electronic devices other than calculators must be left at side, back, or front of the room. Please wait outside the classroom (SW01-1025) until I ask you to come in. This will allow me to put out the papers in alphabetical order. Each quiz will have different versions of each question. You must write your quiz at the location where it is placed.

Note that you may not leave for the first 30 minutes and you may not start if you arrive after the first student has left.

Quiz 2 Results

Failed CPLD Boards

Does your CPLD board's red power LED (D2 ) not turn on when the board is plugged into a USB port? If so, the voltage regulator may have been damaged. It may be possible to power it from an external supply through the 3.3V pin on the pin header connector (disconnect it from the USB port first).

Midterm Exam 2

The second midterm exam will be held on Friday, November 1 from 3:30 to 5:20 PM in SW1-1021. Note that this is not at the regular lecture time.

Although the exam is scheduled for 110 minutes, the room is booked until 6:20 and you may continue writing later if you wish. However, it should be possible to complete the exam in about an hour.

Note that you may not leave for the first 30 minutes and you may not start the exam if you arrive after the first student has left.

The exam will concentrate on the material since the first midterm, although this necessarily includes earlier material. This includes applications of state machines, simulation, interfaces, timing analysis, and the initial part of the lecture on digital logic implementation.

Lab 5

If you think you will benefit from an overview of Modelsim, what the testbench does, how to set up test vectors, etc. for your simulation lab exercise, please show up to the first 15 minutes of your lab session this week. If you are late to class, you'll miss the introduction but you can still work on your code and I'll be available to answer any questions.

Midterm 2 Results

The second midterm exam has been marked and returned. The median was 14/17. The distribution of the marks is shown below.

Lab Office Hours

I will be holding office hours in SW01-3055 from 10:30 AM to 11:20 AM tomorrow morning - if you have any questions about previous/future labs or lab marking, you are welcome to stop by.

Quiz 3

Quiz 3 will be held on Wednesday, November 20 during the regular lecture time (from 9:30 to 10:20 AM) in SW1-1025. The quiz will include questions covering Lectures 7 (Implementation) and Lecture 8 (Analog Interfaces).

Note that you may not leave for the first 30 minutes and you may not start if you arrive after the first student has left.

Guest Lecture (22/11/2024)

Thanks to everyone who participated in this morning's class. As promised, here is a word cloud of your responses:

Final Exam

The final exam for ELEX2117 will be on Friday, December 13 2024 from 1300 to 1600 in SW01-1205.

It will cover all of the material in the course.

The exam will be open-book but all electronic devices other than calculators must be left at side, back, or front of the room. Please wait outside the classroom (SW01-1205) until I ask you to come in. This will allow me to put out the exam papers in alphabetical order. You must write your own exam at the location where it is placed.

You may not leave for the first hour and you may not start the exam if you are more than one hour late.

Final Exam and Final Course Marks

The final exam has been marked and returned by email. The median and maximum final exam marks were 77%, and 99%. The distribution is shown below:

The median and maximum course final marks were also 77% and 99%. The distribution is shown below.

Please let me know if you have any questions about your marks, preferably before 10 AM on Monday, December 16.

ELEX 2117			Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri
Lectures:			13:30		9:30		9:30
Labs:			10:30 (2A) 10:30 (2B)			10:30 (2D)	10:30 (2C)
week	starts	lab
1	Sep 02		holiday
2	Sep 09	0
3	Sep 16	1			Q1
4	Sep 23	2
5	Sep 30		holiday				MT1
6	Oct 07	3
7	Oct 14		holiday		Q2
8	Oct 21	4
9	Oct 28	5					MT2
10	Nov 04	6					WD
11	Nov 11		holiday
12	Nov 18	7			Q3		GL
13	Nov 25	8
14	Dec 02
15	Dec 09						exam
Qn = Quiz n, MTn = Midterm n, GL=Guest Lec., WD = Withdrawal Deadline.

DAY	LAB	HOURS	PROCTOR
Tuesday	SW1-3055	18:00 – 21:00	A
Thursday	SW1-3055	18:00 – 21:00	B
Saturday*	SW1-3055	12:00 – 17:00	C
Sunday*	SW1-3055	12:00 – 17:00	D

Proctor*	Wk3	Wk4	Wk5	Wk6	Wk7	Wk8	Wk9	Wk10	Wk11	Wk12	Wk13
Federico Sarabia	C	B	A	D	B	A	C	B	A	D	B
Faniel Yemane		A	C	B	A	D	B	A	C	B	A
Ryan McKay		D	B	A	C	B	A	D	B	A	C