1. The Project Proposal
The purpose of the project proposal is to set definite goals.
Students are expected to formulate draft project proposals once an
overview of the course has been given. The instructor shall
provide ideas for possible projects. However students shall not
be constrained to choose from among projects suggested by the
instructor. Students may formulate proposals based on their own ideas.
Students may be required to report on past projects as part of the
process of formulating project proposals.
Students must have at least one draft proposal with a clear description
of the expected output. An introduction and background
information may help to provide some context for the proposed
work. Students may propose projects individually or in
groups.
If several groups submit similar proposals, the instructor shall have
the final say as to which group would be allowed to pursue the
project. This may be based on various factors such as who
submitted proposals first and the quality of the proposals.
Students may submit more than one proposal. There is no guarantee
that any proposal submitted would be approved.
2. Contents of the Project Proposal
The appropriate contents of project proposals may vary depending on the
project proposed.
In general, a project proposal must set definite goals. These
goals must be clearly defined. These goals must be measurable.
A detailed timetable is usually desirable along with descriptions of
the roles of various group members in the project. This usually
demonstrates that the students have a good grasp of what the project
involves, since this implies that they are able to state the project's
goals in terms of smaller tasks. A detailed methodology is
desirable for the same reason.
A good introduction, literature review and theoretical background may
be helpful in motivating the project and setting the project in
perspective.
3. The Project Proposal Grade
The Project Proposal Grade is an assessment of a student's performance
in the formulation of a proposal for a course project. The grade
is based on all aspects of a student's conduct and performance relating
to the formulation of a project proposal. A 10-pt scale is used
in grading the student's performance. Only integral scores are given.
The grade considers the students initial efforts at coming up with a
project proposal, attendance and participation in meetings called to
discuss project proposals, a student's initiative, and actual
submission of an approved final project proposal acceptable to the
instructor.
Each of the following questions corresponds to roughly one point in the
10-point scale:
* Did the student submit at least one project proposal with a
description of the scope of the project?
* Did the student submit at least one project proposal with a
sufficiently detailed description of the goals of the project?
* Did the student attend a significant number of meetings called to
discuss the project proposal?
* Did the student attend all meetings called to discuss the project
proposal?
* Did the student show enough initiative in finalizing the project
proposal?
* Did the student have a good grasp of the scope of the project?
* Did the student contribute to discussions on the project proposal?
* Did the student submit the approved final proposal on time?
* Does the final proposal clearly define the scope of the project?
* Does the final proposal have a reasonable timetable acceptable to the
instructor?
The first two items deal with the submission of an initial project
proposal. Students who intend to work together may submit
proposals jointly. The next five items concern a student's conduct in
finalizing the project proposal. The last three items concern the
quality of the final proposal submitted.
These points are presented here as a guide to students as to what is
expected of them during the proposal formulation phase of a project.
The project grade is not strictly limited to covering only the points
listed.
The instuctor may use these points in arriving at an initial estimate
of a student's project proposal grade. The instructor shall take
into account all aspects of a students conduct and performance.
These may have positive or negative effects on the actual grade
given.
The instructor shall also consider the following scale:
The project proposal grade shall be
0 to 4 points if a student has not done enough towards coming up with a
final project proposal,
5 or 6 points if a student's performance is minimally sufficient,
7 or 8 points if a student's performance is above average,
9 or 10 points if a student's performance was excellent.
In cases where the final proposal submitted is not acceptable to the
instructor, students may be required more meetings with the instructor,
subject to penalties in the project proposal grade as the instructor
deems fit.
4. Project Ideas for ELC 152, First Semester, 2005 - 2006
XMCS Players:
*XMCS Player on Linux; let the operating system be
opensource as well
*generalize the XMCS Player available so that it
could handle any XMCS file,
regardless of the number of bits
in the individual samples
*an XMCS Player that could play two single channel
files at the same time, one
file on one channel of the
output, the other file on the other channel
An XMCS Composer
design software that composes an XMCS file
containing tones of specified
frequencies, lasting a specified
amount of time
Generalized XMCS to WAV and WAV to XMCS Conversion
XMCS Recorder
* on Windows
* on Linux
design software that records
sound thru the sound card and stores the
data in XMCS files
wav file reader
write software that extracts all the information in
a wav file and places them in a
text file format so that the
structure of a wav file could be understood
better; write corresponding
software that takes the text file representation
and converts it back into exactly
the same wav file as the original
mp3 file reader, (audio formats)
bmp file reader, jpeg file reader, gif file reader, png file reader
(image formats)
sames idea as a wav file reader
stand alone microprocessor/microcontroller-based tone generator
(involves hardware)
design a microcontroller system with keypad input
and DAC and speaker;
based on keypad input, the
microcontroller plays tones or DTMF tones;
tone samples are generated by the
microcontroller using a digital
sinusoidal oscillator
Acquisition of regularly sampled data thru the parallel port (involves
hardware)
* hardware system would probably require ADC, RAM,
timers/counters and
control logic; software component
required on PC
Software radio
* make improvements to the digital amplitude
modulator
*correct bugs and generalize the
acceptable XMCS file formats that
are acceptable
*correct bugs and make the output
format more flexible/user-specified
e.g. 16 bits,
13 bits, 9 bits, signed, unsigned
*correct bugs and write a version
that does not use floating point
calculations
in generating the output
* design a demodulator for the digital amplitude
modulator
* design a digital frequency modulator
Improvements to Graphical LTI System Designer and Simulator
* add an option to normalize an LTI system so that
its maximum gain is 1;
add an option to set the gain
* add the capability to solve for the poles and
zeroes of a given LTI system
* improve the graphing capabilities of the software
ADPCM
16:8 ADPCM
8:3 or 8:2 ADPCM
Design and implement an ADPCM link (involves
hardware)
