Slide 1

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 2

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 3

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 4

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 5

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 6

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 7

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 8

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 9

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 10

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 11

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 12

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 13

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 14

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 15

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 16

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 17

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 18

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 19

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 20

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 21

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 22

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014


Slide 23

FLEXIBLE PLATFORMS FOR TEACHING
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS
Liviu Breniuc, Cristian-Győző Haba
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
“Gheorghe Asachi” Technical University of Iasi

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• Following the tremendous evolution of the
microelectronic and IT technologies, the embedded
measurement systems have started to incorporate
large sets of features and functionalities.
• Measurement systems have become faster and more
accurate with the advent of new categories of
intelligent sensors.
• These systems incorporate now electronics that
implement a great part of conditioning, processing and
filtering, tasks that were once taken in charge by the
computing system to which the sensors were
connected.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Introduction
• We present our work for developing a flexible
platform for teaching embedded systems and two
tools (covering matrix and oriented graph)
associated to the flexible platform that can be
used to develop the learning paths for one or
more related courses.
• For demonstration it is presented a flexible
platform which can be used in applications that
measure, process and record quantities that
characterize the environment status.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• Authors have developed several embedded systems
that can be used for teaching purposes.
• The platforms are composed of several modules that
can communicate using an RF connection. Each
platform has a central processing unit that is
implemented using a microcontroller or FPGAs
development board and several extension modules
that extend the feature set of the development board.
• Changing or adding sensor modules to a sensor node
can modify or enhance the node functionality. The
platform use smart sensors that can communicate with
a microcontroller via SPI, I2C, UART ports.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Platform description
• For demonstration purposes we will present our last
developed flexible platform aimed for teaching embedded
systems targeted for environmental measurements.
• The flexible platform, denoted as EMBENVP, consists of
several sensor nodes that measure physical quantities,
make an A/D conversion and communicate the conversion
result to the central unit that can process, display and store
this data from the nodes.
• Using this platform the students can learn the following:
programming the microcontroller board using C or C++,
communicating with the smart sensors using the SPI, I2C or
UART ports, creation of a sensor network based on a
custom designed or a known communication protocol such
as ZigBee or MiWi.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP System
Station module

PmodCLP
Bateries

Sensor node module

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

RF
link

Bateries

PmodRF1

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodRF1
PmodGPS

PmodSD

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

USB link
MAX44009
8

PC +
software

MAX44009

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Sensor node module (SN)
•
•
•

Built around a Cerebot Nano development
board from Digilent.
The SN can contain several sensors, the exact
number and type depend of the application.
One SN module we have built contains the
following components:
– temperature and humidity sensor SHT21 from
Sensirion,
– COZIR carbon dioxide sensor from GSS (Gas Sensing
Solution) mounted inside,
– eight MAX44009 ambient light sensors (ALS) from
Maxim,
– PmodRF1 module from Digilent for RF
communication with the station
– 3.7 V Lithium Ion Battery.
– RS232 adapter or a Pmod USBUART converter also
from Digilent used for development, debugging and
verification.

COZIR
Sensor

LED

GSS

Cerebot
Nano

Bateries

PmodRF1

MAX44009
HEF4052
SHT21

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

MAX44009

8

MAX44009

Station module (ST)
• Built around the Cerebot MX3ck
development board from Digilent.
• Includes:
– PmodRF1 radio transceiver module for
communication with sensor nodes
– PmodGPS module for mapping measured
data
– PmodCLP LCD display
– PmodSD interface for SD card which is used
for recording the measured data.

PmodCLP
Bateries

PmodRF1

PmodGPS

• The station can be connected to a PC using
an USB port. The connection is used for
development, debugging and verification
of the software application running on the
ST or for transferring recorded data.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Cerebot
MX3ck

PmodSD

Platform operation
• SN module measures temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide level and
sunshine duration and send data to ST module.
• Flashing LEDs on the ST and SN modules indicates that the communication
is established between the two modules.
• Results of current measurement are displayed on LCD display of ST
module:
–
–
–
–
–
–

battery level,
temperature in °C,
relative humidity,
no presence of sun,
maximum and minimum illumination,
carbon dioxide level.

• Because space available on LCD display is limited, on the second line of
display is showed alternatively illumination and carbon dioxide level
respectively.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

EMBENVP system with a sensor node module
oriented to environmental parameter
measurements
LCD Display

Sensor node
module

GPS receiver and
antenna

Batteries

Cerebot MX3ck

RS232 interface
SD Card Slot

RF transceiver

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Educational use
• The aim of building the platform was to provide a
support for multiple laboratory works that introduce
students to different well established or emergent
hardware and software technologies.
• The architecture of the platform evolved from different
other platforms that have been used for teaching
purposes but which were aimed at measuring only one
parameter such as temperature or humidity.
• The platform is conceived to support laboratory works
for students in the Instrumentation and Data
Acquisition and the Applied Computer Science
specializations.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Covering matrix
• The different platform features can be associated
to specific topics that are included in the courses
taught in these two specializations.
• Covering matrix encodes relationship between
features (f) covered in courses (c)
• x sign in cell (f,c) indicates that platform feature f
covers a topic in course c and thus can be use for
demonstration of that topic during a lab work
using the proposed platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x
x

Communication protocols

x
x

Signal
Processing

x

Distributed
Systems

x
x
x

Real Time
Systems

x
x
x
x
x

Communication
Systems

x

Intelligent
Sensors

x
x

Object Oriented
Programming

Microcontrollers

Microcontrollers
Digital I/O
Analog I/O
Timers
Real Time Clock

Data Acquisition

Platform Features

Digital Systems

Electrical
Measurements

Courses

Programming

Covering matrix for EMBENVP system
x

x

x
x

x
x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x
x
x

UART
I2C
SPI
RF custom
RF ZigBee
Data display
Temperature meas.

x
x

x

x

x

Humidity meas.
Dew Point meas.

x
x

x
x

x
x

x
x

Position meas.
Network topologies

x

x

x

x

x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x
x

x

C++ programming

x
x

x

x
x

x

x

C programming

Power saving

x
x
x
x
x

x
x
x

x

x

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

x
x

x

x

x
x

Discussion
• Analysis of the covering matrix shows that:
– platform features contribute unevenly to different
courses
– the structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the courses content established by
the teachers.
– structure and content of the covering matrix
depends on the structure of the sensor node (set
of sensors and functional modules)
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Teaching process
• Laboratory works were developed to gradually introduce
the students into the topic of embedded systems.
• With basic notions achieved, the system is then extended
based on a modular design which enables the addition of
new devices and features that turns the system into one
capable to measure environment quantities such as
temperature, humidity, illumination, sun duration, CO2
levels etc.
• Topics must be presented to students in a gradual way
based on topics complexity, interrelationships as well
appropriateness established by course curricula and
teacher's vision on the course development.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph
• Considering the set of topics that a teacher can demonstrate using
a flexible platform and the relationships between these topics, we
can create an oriented graph that cover the many learning paths a
teacher can take by using the flexible platform.
• An oriented graph can be constructed where each topic is a node in
the graph and an oriented edge exists between two nodes if a
relationship exists between the two.
• An oriented edge will exist from topic a to topic b if:
– topic b can be presented only after topic a is presented,
– topic b is more complex then topic a, or
– any other such relationships.

• The oriented graph thus can depict the learning paths a teacher can
take given a set of topics and the relationships between these
topics.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Oriented graph for EMBENVP system

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Learning path in oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Two alternative learning paths in
oriented graph

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions
• Development of laboratory equipment to offer
the basic training but also an up to date image of
the problems encountered in real life is a
constant concern for university teachers.
• A flexible platform for teaching embedded
systems oriented through environmental
quantities measurement is proposed.
• The students enrolled in two specializations of
our faculty were gradually introduced into the
topics of embedded systems by using this
platform.
6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Conclusions (2)
• The large number of devices, modules,
technologies and features included in the
platform allow teachers to select various learning
paths that can be adapted to several courses
offered by our university.
• Based on the particularity of the course, teachers
can decide which module should be discussed in
detail (schematic, operation, configuration,
debugging etc) and which ones should be
considered only as a black box.

Conclusions (3)
• During laboratory works the students showed a good
interested in the applications developed with the
proposed platform and confirmed that the learning
curve was lean enough to understand the topics to be
demonstrated and acquire the required skills.
• The authors are currently working on defining the
metrics that will allow a better evaluation of the
platform and on developing a methodology for the
selection of optimum set of learning paths for each of
the courses included in the covering matrix.

6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies
Barcelona - 7th - 9th of July 2014

Invitation
• 2014 International Conference on Electrical
and Power Engineering, October 16-18, 2014
• Iasi, Romania
• IEEE technical sponsored conference
• http://www.epe.tuiasi.ro/2014