Welcome to ES 4!
Quick links: Canvas — Campuswire — Gradescope — Textbook online — VHDLweb problems
This is the home page for Tufts ES 4, Introduction to Digital Logic.
Office hours
- Ravi Wednesdays 6-7pm, Halligan 223 (the lab)
- Lucas Fridays 12-1pm, Halligan 228D (next door to the lab)
- Prof Bell Mondays 4:30-6:30pm, Wednesdays 10am-12pm, Halligan 234
Schedule and links
General due dates, unless otherwise specified:
- Reading checks are due on the day of class at 11am, via Canvas.
- Homework/assessments are due on Tuesdays at 1:30pm (i.e., at class time), via Gradescope.
- Prelabs are due 24 hours before your lab section, via Gradescope.
- Lab writeups are due at the time of your lab section the following week, via Gradescope.
Week 1 (September 5)
Class begins in Robinson 253 (aka the lecture hall in the SEC). You don’t need to do anything before class, just show up!
Introduction (Tuesday 9/6)
Numbers in binary
Just for fun
Boolean equations, truth tables, and circuits (Thursday 9/8)
Week 2 (September 12)
Manipulating boolean equations (Tuesday 9/13)
Possibly helpful
Minimizing logic with Karnaugh maps (Thursday 9/15)
Possibly helpful
Lab
Possibly helpful
Building a circuit on a breadboard from a schematic (This video shows a different circuit from an earlier iteration of the course, but walks through the process of drawing a schematic and building it on a breadboard.)
Week 3 (September 19)
Multiplexers and FPGAs (Tuesday 9/20)
Just for fun
Timing combinational logic (Thursday 9/22)
Possibly helpful
Lab
Assignments
Week 4 (September 26)
VHDL for combinational logic (Tuesday 9/27)
Computer arithmetic (Thursday 9/29)
Lab
Assignments
Just for fun
Week 5 (October 3)
No class on Tuesday (10/4)
Testing and testbenches (Thursday 10/6)
Structural modeling
Lab
There is no prelab or lab report this week; just follow the video tutorial and get the AND gate working.Assignments
Week 6 (October 10)
Adders and other combinational circuits (Tuesday 10/11)
Lab
Possibly helpful
Just for fun
Exam 1 (Thursday 10/13)
Week 7 (October 17)
Latches and flip-flops (Tuesday 10/18)
Describing sequential logic with VHDL (Thursday 10/20)
Lab
No new lab this week; complete lab 5 if you haven’t finished.
Free-form VHDL simulation
Possibly helpful
Just for fun
Week 8 (October 23)
More on sequential logic and VHDL (Tuesday 10/25)
State machines (Thursday 10/27)
Lab
Optional lab stuff
Possibly useful
Homework
Week 9 (October 31)
Moore on state machines (Tuesday 11/1)
Timing sequential logic (Thursday 11/3)
Possibly useful
Lab
No new lab this week; complete lab 6 if you haven’t finished.
Just for fun
Week 10 (November 7)
No class on Tuesday due to “Tufts Friday”
Timing in real life, and some ethical dilemmas (11/10)
No new reading for today!Lab
Pick one of the following three labs to complete. You probably want to coordinate with your project team so you collectively cover them all.Week 11 (November 14)
Memory: registers, RAM, and ROM (Tuesday 11/15)
Exam 2 (Thursday 11/17)
Lab
No new lab this week; complete lab 7 and start work on the final project.
Week 12 (November 21)
Digital peripherals and protocols (Tuesday 11/22)
Possibly helpful
Just for fun
Projects
No class on Thursday, enjoy your Thanksgiving break!