ELEC 371: Microprocessor Interfacing and Embedded Systems
Course Laboratory Work
In ELEC 371, laboratory sessions required the use of Altera’s DE0-CV FPGA board. In the sessions, a mixture of assembly language and C code was written for the NIOS-II processor on Altera’s DE0-CV FPGA board to fulfill laboratory assessment components.
Lab work available at: https://github.com/tkjsung/ELEC371-Lab
Course Info
Text in this section is taken from the website of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Queen’s University (https://ece.queensu.ca). Text was extracted in 2022.
This course provides an in-depth exploration of hardware/software interfacing for microprocessor-based systems, including microcontrollers, with the aim of imparting sufficient knowledge to enable students to design and implement systems of their own, particularly for embedded applications. The practical aspects of the course are illustrated with the 32-bit Altera Nios II instruction set architecture and soft processor for implementation with other components within field-programmable logic chips, but the principles that are conveyed using this example are largely applicable to any embedded microcontroller or general-purpose microprocessor. The philosophy of the course is to progress from low-level internal interconnections and input/output interfaces, through software issues and interrupt processing, to high-level considerations for embedded and system-on-chip applications. In this manner, the course seeks to develop an appreciation of attention to technical details while also maintaining an overall system perspective. Laboratory activity provides opportunities for practical application of the hardware and software concepts. Technical case studies are also employed to illustrate the application of the relevant concepts. This course builds on and supplements knowledge from other courses on digital logic, computer architecture, circuits and electronics, and software/programming.