ECE 280/Summer 2024

This will be a page to keep track of updates to the ECE 280 lab manual during Summer 2024.

• June
  • All labs converted to single-file
  • Philosophy: convert sections to look like ECE 110
    • ECE 110:Abstract, Objectives, Background, Pre-Laboratory Exercises, Pre-Laboratory Assignment, Equipment, Experimental Exercises, Exploration, Assignment
    • Proposal: Purpose, Pre-lab Exercises, Pre-lab Assignment, Lab Exercises, Lab Report
  • Added code to counters to give n/N values with N being the total (I am more proud of this than I should be, really...)

Lab 0

v1->v2 recommendations

• In the Pratt Pundit section about MATLAB installation, it might be helpful to replace where it says that the installation will be 12 GB with a range, something like 8-12 GB, since when Adam and I installed we ended up with different sizes that were both less than 12GB.
  • Done
• We also thought it might be helpful to make installing MATLAB a part of the prelab deliverable—our idea was to have the prelab deliverable to be a Gradescope submission where students upload/submit something along the lines of: the selfie they took in front of the lab door, a screenshot of MATLAB booted up, and a textbox submission where they type in the toolboxes they installed (we often have an issue where students don't read the pundit closely enough, and so they end up having to reinstall MATLAB halfway through the semester to get a toolbox they forgot to install at the beginning).
  • Done - I kept the tutorial as part of the in-class but added the installation to the pre-lab. Also - people should certainly not need to reinstall MATLAB if they are missing a package - there's an easy way to add packages later. I have added that to the MATLAB page.
• In general, we thought it might be good to standardize formatting of lab manual sections similarly to how the ECE 110 lab manuals are, to have the sections: Purpose, Pre-lab Exercises, Pre-lab Assignment, Lab Exercises, and Lab Report, and to have those be uniform across all of the lab manuals for the class (with the potential addition of something like a Background section).
  • I am going to see if I can make Labs 0 and 1 fit into the full ECE 110 format; if not, once we decide on the sections, I will work to map things into those.
• Finally, we thought it might be good to add a portion to the lab that gets into LaTeX and basic functionality and guidelines for writing lab reports—I feel like 280 is kind of the class where you're meant to really learn how to write lab reports, but a lot of people find that overwhelming, so providing an intro and establishing some basic standards would be really helpful. In particular, we were thinking that this could be turned into a post-lab deliverable, maybe something where we have students upload a "lab report" written in LaTeX with all of the basic sections that are used in the subsequent weeks of lab, plus maybe they have to put in an equation or insert a photo (maybe the certificate of completion of the MATLAB onramp course?) in the Results and Discussion section, sort of the equivalent of a "hello world" for the skills they need to write relatively polished lab reports in LaTeX.
  • Now that EGR 105 is in place (and since students could have skipped EGR 103 for the last five years) we will have a good number of students who may have never seen LaTeX (AFAIK no other class before ECE 280 actually requires it). I don't know if students would need the full "EGR 103 Lab 1" treatment. I am going to leave this as a future deliverable for now once I get a better idea of how the section remapping works

Lab 1

v1->v2 recommendations

• We thought it might help to format the second paragraph of the Purpose section in bullet points—the paragraph format we thought makes it easy for students to skip over reading it and get confused about what they're meant to be doing each week.
• In the third sentence of section 2.1: the phrase "in using a number" is a bit confusing, maybe something like "The octave each note is in should be denoted by a number. Higher numbers indicate higher overall pitches." would be more clear.
• Figs 1 and 2 have somewhat poor image quality; it might be worth updating them.
  • Also for Fig 1 specifically, if updating it would be good to use an example that already has a treble clef in the photo. We could even use a software like Musescore or something similar to manufacture an example—it could still be Beethoven's Fifth, or it could be something else
• In sentence 2 of section 2.2: there's an extra "the" before the word "mainly."
• In the second-to-last sentence of 2.2, "Note that...": I don't think it's really necessary for them to know that the piece is written in C minor—all they need to know is that the key signature denotes which pitches are "automatically" sharp or flat, and I worry that the extraneous information without much explanation might overwhelm people who don't know much about music.
• Sentence 2 of paragraph 2 of 2.3: this sentence feels somewhat incomplete. An extra phrase would help, something like "a quarter note has twice the duration of an eighth note, which has twice that of a sixteenth note, and so on" or "a quarter note has twice the duration of an eighth note and half the duration of a half note and so on"
• Sentence 4 of paragraph 2 of 2.3: "scare" should be "score"
• 2.4 OVERALL: Would it make sense to design a Pratt Pundit page with a more in depth explanation of different effects and their implementations in MATLAB? We could also include links to different references that we normally include in the lab slideshow or the Canvas page.
• 2.4, overlapping tones, sentence 3: "advance" should be "advanced"
• 2.4, harmonics, paragraph 1 last sentence: this should be turned into a note, with the same formatting as the other notes have (i.e. bolded, "NOTE" in all caps)
  • Also somewhere in this section, it might be worth noting that different combinations of amplitudes for each harmonic can correspond to certain instruments students might be trying to synthesize, and maybe adding a link to this page (it's already linked on Canvas, but might be worth having everything in the lab manual).
  • And, similarly, a link to this page could be added to instrument synthesis in 2.4. If a Pratt Pundit page is created, then both links could be included there instead.
• 2.4, harmonics, paragraph 2 sentence 1: the second part of this sentence is kind of unclear, replacing it with something like "any signal can be expressed as a sum of sin and/or cos waves" might bring the point home a bit more efficiently for students
• 2.4, instrument synthesis, sentence 4: "where as" should be one word
• 2.4, reverb, sentence 2: "ceiling" should be plural to match the other words in the list
• 2.4, reverb, second-to-last sentence: the space in the parenthetical before "300" should be deleted
• 2.4, reverb, last sentence: "on the next page" should be changed to "in the next section."
• 2.5: The parentheticals "(loudness)" and "(post-echo)" seemed somewhat unnecessary to us.
• 2.5, sentence 4: there should be a "the" inserted before "echo's."
• 2.5: The formatting of the question about the causality of the system in parentheses disrupts the flow of reading—could this be reworded to be a statement? Something like "Consider what this indicates about the causality of the system."
• IN GENERAL: it might be worth considering separating the background into two sections: Week 1 Background and Week 2 Background.
  • The same applies for the instructions (in which case we should add in a note that if a student used "Mary Had a Little Lamb" or a different song that they don't want to submit as their final song, they should generate a note vector for their final song before proceeding with step 7.
• Instructions #1 sentence 1: The parenthetical should be adjusted and integrated more into the sentence, and "approximately" should be taken out, something like "Make sure that your score is a reasonable length—your final score should be 30-60 seconds—and have a source from which..."
  • The parenthetical in the first note can also be deleted (not all video game music is computer generated, and also I think people generally understand what it means for music to be computer generated)
  • Also, formatting between notes should be kept consistent, i.e. one shouldn't be italicized if the other isn't
• Questions in the instructions should be altered to be checkpoints followed by a deliverable, e.g. "Checkpoint (1): Explain to your TA why the endpoint in the example time vector above is 1 - 1/f_s, instead of 1" followed by "Deliverable: Write up your answer to the question above and include it in the Discussion section of your lab report," or have a deliverable at the end of the instructions that reads something like "Deliverable: Write up your answers to the questions addressed in Checkpoints N - M and include them in the Discussion section of your lab report."
  • Also, these checkpoints shouldn't be interrupt the text of the instruction. For example, in #2, rather than the checkpoint coming before the sentence beginning with "You may change...", it should go after the note.
• #4, sentence 1: saying "rests or silent portions" implies that there are silent portions in musical scores which aren't rests, might be better to use a parenthetical, something like "For the rests (silent portions) in your score..." or a similar expression.
• #4, HINT: worth noting that I don't think most students use this hint. Most of them just use whatever method they've already established for generating notes, but setting the amplitude value to 0, so I'm not sure how necessary including it is.
• #5, sentence 2: the parentheses can be replaced with a semicolon: "after repeated notes; otherwise, the three..."
• #5, last two sentences: It's worth considering shortening the interesting side note. I think the last sentence could be cut, and the overall meaning would be preserved. The phrase "Interesting side note" could also be deleted; we thought it would serve the same purpose if it starts with "Theoretically,...."
• A checkpoint could be added after #6 prompting the student to play what they have for the TA
• #s 7-9 cover a lot of ground, so it may be helpful to create a set of checkpoints that covers them to let students touch base with the TA and to let the TA get insight into how the students are doing
  • This could look like a checkpoint after 9 that prompts the student to play the TA their song before and after modification and explain how/why it was improved
  • Or could look like a checkpoint after each step (7, 8, and 9) and then a deliverable after 9 that prompts them to write up an explanation of how each effect affected (haha) the sound - this could get at the first item in the discussion section of their lab report
  • The question currently after 8 could be wrapped up into a deliverable (potentially as part of the one after 9), or it could be turned into a note, rather than a question
• #9: parentheses around "Watch your amplitudes!" are unnecessary - these could be removed
• section 4 (lab submission) generally: Each bullet point has a lot of sentences; I'm not sure that students will read through them as carefully as would be ideally as is. Would it be possible to break these down any further?
• section 4, sentence 2: should be a comma after "final array, y"
• sect. 4, sentence 3: potentially consider changing "Example" to "e.g." for consistency with the rest of the lab manual
  • Same thing for "For example, Huettel_Twinkle.wav” in sent. 6
• sect. 4, sentence 4: should be "between -1 and 1" (not "1 and -1") for consistency
• sect. 4, second bullet: this should also be broken up more. Much of it I think could be worked into a deliverable maybe at the end of the instructions
• IN GENERAL FOR SUBMISSION: I think it might be worth trying to figure out an alternative to Canvas or Box for file submissions
  • we could use the "online assignment" option on gradescope for more flexibility, or we could have two assignments on gradescope for this lab: one for the lab report and another for file drop (the same could apply for the image processing labs and in general for when we have them submit large chunks of code that are potentially awkward in-line in lab reports)

Lab 2

v1->v2 recommendations

• intro second paragraph sentence 2: comma before “such as a” should be deleted
• 3.1 #1 sentence 2: add “in which” before “you plan”
• 3.1: might need to be more clear about how exactly a new blank model is created: could say "Hover over Blank Model and click 'Create Model' to create a new blank model"
  • also, "Blank Model" and "Create Model" (if the text is edited) should be bolded
• 3.1 #2 sentence 3: “blocks” formatting somewhat confusing given the convention established for bolding, should it maybe be written just in italics?
• We could potentially add a checkpoint at the end of exercise 1, something along the lines of “show your TA your blank model and the open Simulink Library Browser window”
  • this would likely replace 3.1 #3
• 3.2 #1 There is no "right panel" anymore, might need to be updated for current UI
• 3.2 #1 sentences 3-4: the phrasing right now isn’t as straightforward as it could be, and I think it makes it easier for students to get lost. Could be condensed/reworked to read something like “Add the Signal Generator block to your model by clicking and holding it…”
  • A potential option for reformatting is currently written out in lab02F24.tex 3.2 #1 (with the previous version commented out). In general, this style of bulletting is somewhat easier to read, and generally could be used as an example for other more wordy instructions (e.g. 3.2 #2)
• 3.2 #2: the actual instruction in this step is somewhat hidden in the middle of the block of text. I would maybe move sentences 3 and 4 to the beginning, and then maybe add a sub-indented bullet that’s something like “you can do so by…”
  • I also think it may be helpful to specify here that the frequency units should be rad/sec
• I think 3.2 #3 could be turned into a checkpoint, something like “save your model as ‘lab2demo.slx’ and show your TA the modified parameters of your signal generator block”
• 3.2 #4b: everything after “Notice” should be turned into a note on the side, and I think in doing so you could delete the last sentence
• 3.2 #5c should either be a note or a sub-bullet under 5b, since it doesn’t contain any specific instruction
• Should we add a figure between steps 5 and 6 that shows what the model should look like just with all the blocks dragged out as directed?
  • Also potentially a figure after 6 that shows a completed model?
• 3.2 #6c: the block of text is very long - is there any way it can be broken up at all?
• There should be a deliverable after step 6 prompting the student to take a screenshot of their completed model
  • potentially also a checkpoint, but if we have a figure after 5 or 6 then I don't think we necessarily need a checkpoint here
• Why is exercise #3 section 4 (not 3.3?) - I think it would be helpful for all of the lab exercises should be consolidated within the “instructions” section, potentially as subsections
• Section 4 #5 isn’t an instruction right now, it should probably either be rephrased to read as an instruction or it should be turned into a note
• Section 4 #6: this is a fairly large block of text. I think it might be easier for students if we pared down the instruction itself a bit and then added a checkpoint that’s something like discuss with your TA why the original output signal doesn’t look correct, and show them the two versions of your signal, followed by a deliverable that is a picture of the final signal (with timestep 0.01 s)
• 4 #6 sentence 1: in theory they've already run the simulation. do we want them to run it a second time, or should this read "if you haven't already, run the simulation now"
• Also 4 #6 second paragraph sentence 2: “details” in “Solver details” should be bolded
• The inclusion of sections 4.1-4.4 in the middle of the instructions is somewhat distracting, I think the actual content of the sections is good, but it might be helpful to move them either into a “background” section or into an appendix of sorts so that they don’t disrupt the workflow of the lab itself
• 4.5 #1 this instruction covers a lot of ground, and it’s not totally clear that the sub-indented numbers are meant to be subcomponents of this one. This could be helped by changing those bullets to be lettered (a-h) rather than numbered (1-8) and by adding a sentence after “for x and y in the MATLAB workspace” that says something like “The process for doing so is as follows: “ or “Perform the following steps for signals x and y:” or something like that
  • Another option is that that first section could be converted into a sort of summary: “In this exercise we will be…” and then starting the actual instructions with: 1. Start a new blank model and save it as lab2ex4.slx, 2. Move the Signal Editor block into the Simulink workspace, etc.
  • In this case, we should add a step after they’ve created one piecewise signal that says to repeat the steps above for y
• 4.5 indented #s 1 and 2: “Signal Editor” should be bolded for consistency when describing the block
• 4.5 indented #2: The quotation mark before “To create and edit…” should be reversed
  • same with “Plot/Edit” in #4
  • and both quotes in #7 and #8
• 4.5 indented #4: not sure if this is just my MATLAB, but I didn’t have the option to click “Plot/edit,” I had to right click on signal 1 and then select “edit signal." Worth looking into to see if it's a general inconsistency with 2024a or just a quirk of my setup
• 4.5 I think we could also add a checkpoint after #8 to have them show their piecewise signals to the TA
• 4.5 normal #2: It’s not immediately clear that they’re meant to be using the To Workspace blocks for this. I would maybe separate this into two instructions: one that prompts them to create z by taking the product of x and y (maybe even stating what block to use to do so), and a second on that says something like “use To Workspace blocks to save each of these signals, making sure that each block is set to create an array”
• 4.5 #3: add “and run your model” at the end of the sentence, it’s not totally intuitive that you have to actually run things for the to workspace blocks to work
• 4.5 #5 can be turned into a deliverable
• 4.6: I think yahoo has updated their interface, everything is pretty similar about downloading the data, but there’s no “Apply” button now, so references to that should probably be taken out
• 4.6 #1f: add “worth” after “days’” or remove the apostrophe
• 4.6 I think we can add a checkpoint after #1. Something like “show your TA your final 60 by 2 array and discuss your intuition for how to apply a 5-point moving average filter to the data.”
• 4.6 #2 this is a large block of text, and I think it might be easy for students to get lost trying to follow it. In particular, I think only the first two sentences are strictly necessary to be contained in the body of the instruction itself. “Note that” after could be turned into a note to the side of the instruction, or it could be a sub-bullet. Same thing applies to the italicized sentence at the end of the instruction, although I think that if possible, it should be reformatted to match the rest of the lab report (i.e. not italicized, perhaps in bold and/or expressed as a sub-bullet to #2)
• 4.6 I think we could also add a checkpoint after #2 where we ask students to show their TA their completed moving average filter—I normally have students come check that with me anyways. There should probably also be a deliverable here asking them to submit a pic of the simulink model
• 4.6 #3: insert “, select” before “Model Settings” and bold “Mo” in “Model”
  • Also either “type” in “Solver selection type” should be bolded, or “solver” in “Solver selection solver” should be un-bolded for consistency
• We should add a checkpoint after 4.6 #4 asking them to discuss the questions that are currently listed under #5 with the TA and to share their plot, followed by a deliverable asking them to submit the plot and to write up answers to the questions in their own words
  • This deliverable would replace #s 5 and 6
• 5.2: in the section with the questions from exercise #5, the formatting of the questions should match what’s listed in the body of the lab manual
• After 5.3 we should consider deleting the sentence “Each group should turn in one report.” since we usually require each individual to submit a report
• GENERAL THOUGHT: do we want this lab to have a prelab? And if so, would it be worth maybe turning exercises 1-3 into the prelab?

Lab 3

v1->v2 recommendations

• Introduction: potentially replace the parentheses around “be they speech or music” with commas or em dashes
• Background eqn (2) (flanging) is the subscript on the last y supposed to be 1, not i?
• Instructions first paragraph: Appendix A is mentioned here - does that still exist? I can’t find it in the lab manual doc
• 5.1 #2: “in which” should be added before “you plan to save files”
• 5.1 #2: I also don’t necessarily think they need the full description here, and I think more is lost from the wordiness - could delete sentences 4 and 5
• 5.1 #3-5: these seem somewhat unnecessary to me, given students should already have completed lab 2
  • steps 4 and 5, especially, don’t contain actual instructions, so it might be helpful to either consolidate the content of these three steps into a side note or to delete them entirely
• 5.1 steps 6 and 7 should maybe be combined into one instruction, since there’s no actual prompt in #6 right now
• Figs 1 and 2 should be replaced with higher quality images
  • Also is there any way to reformat so that Fig 2 doesn’t take up the entire page and it’s more directly in-line, or is this an unavoidable LaTeX quirk?
• 5.1 #9: the “t” in “the” should be updated to match the rest of the word - it’s in kind of a strange font right now
• Could add a checkpoint after 5.1 #13
• 5.1 #14: it’s unclear whether they should be doing both 14a and 14b or if they should choose one or the other - maybe this should be specified in the first part of #14?
• 5.1 #14a: the cables that are needed to connect the function generator to the computer, as well as to the oscilloscope, should be included in the “Equipment Needed” section
• 5.1 #14b(iv): should be “via headphones” not “via headpones”
• I think we could also add a checkpoint after #14
• 5.2 #1: I remember the “NOTE”s being bolded in a previous lab - do we want to keep that convention? This applies to all of the notes in this section
• 5.2 #4: could add a checkpoint after #4 to explain to the TA how you created your model to implement the difference equation, then a deliverable to write up how the Simulink model is related to the difference equation
• 5.2 #5: same note here about the appendix (B) - I couldn’t find this in the lab manual or Canvas?
• 5.2 could add a checkpoint after #7, something along the lines of play the output for your TA, then a deliverable to answer the second question currently listed on pg. 11 (”What do you hear when a signal is processed using the single echo system?”). could also maybe add in question #5 (”Why does the output sound this way? (Relate your observations to the equation describing the system.)”)
• 5.2 also should probably add a deliverable after #8 to write up an explanation of how changes of a and D affect output
• 5.2 should add a deliverable at the end of the section that prompts the student to write up answers to questions 6-9 on pg. 11
• 5.3 #2: similar to 5.2 #4 I think we could add in a checkpoint followed by a deliverable after step 2 that addresses the first discussion prompt for the reverb exercise
• 5.3: should steps 2 and 3 be switched? I feel like it’s confusing to be creating a model which loads a signal from workspace that hasn’t been initialized yet
• 5.3 #4: “What do you hear?” should be turned into a deliverable that gets at the second discussion prompt
• 5.3 #5: I think it would be good to have a checkpoint here to discuss how modifying a and D affects the sound, and at the very least a deliverable for the third and fourth discussion prompts
• 5.3 #7: the section starting at “You will now compare” should be separated from the first part of the instruction - it should be indented differently, or there should be a skipped line before it, or both
• 5.3 I also think it would be good to have a checkpoint after #7 where we ask the students to play the real-time reverberator for their TA, as well as a deliverable asking them to compare reverb and echo (discussion prompt 5)
• 5.3 #8: don’t we usually provide the allpass reverberator on canvas? Should the instruction say to download the file and open it?
• Also I think we can add a deliverable after 5.3 #8 asking the students to compare the simple and allpass reverberators (prompt 6)
• 5.4 #2 I think this might be a good place to add a checkpoint, just something prompting them to show their TA the opened simulink file, so that TAs can make sure students are progressing okay
• 5.4 #4 “What do you hear?” should be turned into a deliverable, same as in 5.3
• 5.4 #5 I think it would be good to have both a checkpoint and a deliverable either here or after #6, checkpoint just asking them to discuss with the TA how modifying each parameter affects the sound, and then deliverable prompting them to write that up (discussion prompt 2)
• 5.4 a deliverable should be added at the end of the section asking students to write up answers to discussion prompts 3 and 4 (currently on pg. 16)
• section 6, wrap up: I think the wrap-up instructions might be better moved into their own subsection of instructions, maybe 5.5, so that the “lab report” section remains consistent between manuals
• 6.3: I’m fairly sure both of the first two bullets are included in the questions asked in the instructions - usually students are kind of confused (or at least ask me a lot of questions) about what exactly they should be answering, so it might be more straightforward to write something like “Answer all questions posed in deliverables (1-N)”, or to list each of the deliverables out, but I feel like that defeats the purpose of having them in the body of the lab manual to begin with
• 6.4: Same comment as with lab 2 about “Each group should turn in ONE report.”

Lab 4

v1->v2 recommendations

• section 1 sentence 3: insert “and the” before “Audio System Toolbox”
• section 2, first sentence after bullet points: I think the sentence might read a bit better if we delete the “the” ahead of “two major subsystems”
• section 2 last sentence: two parentheticals one after the other might be too much, I think either of them (or both) could be removed
• section 3: the NOTE should be bolded for consistency with other lab manuals
• 5.1 #1 doesn’t seem to give any specific instruction; the instruction itself seems to be #2, so the content in #1 might be better as another paragraph under the one that begins “The encoding process is relatively simple”, before the numbering of instructions for the exercise stars
• Also 5.1 #1 is there any way we can adjust the graphic so that the text from the code doesn’t go out of the box? We could have it wrap around maybe?
• 5.1 #2b: the note in parentheses should be bolded, taken out of parentheses, and slightly removed from the rest of the text to be consistent with notes in the other labs
• 5.1 #2c: the actual thing that should be implemented is a bit hidden here, it might help to insert a sentence saying something like “For each key input, you should find the corresponding row and column frequencies using the 4x3 matrices dtmf.colTones and dtmf.rowTones. For example, to translate the key ‘6’…” and then continue with the example code
• 5.1 #2 it’s also worth considering the fact that, especially if we remove #1 as a numbered instruction, #2 will be the only “step” in the exercise. in light of that, it might be helpful to break the subinstructions down and turn them into the main enumerated items in the exercise writeup in the manual
  • if this were the case, we would be committed to a more guided walkthrough of writing the encoder function. in that case, I think we probably wouldn’t need a checkpoint at the beginning. we could start with how to encode a single key and go through that in a few steps, and then cover how to string them together (probably one additional step)
  • I’m including a mockup of what the first couple steps of this could look like in the latex file lab04F24.tex
• 5.1 the bolded “HAVE YOUR TA/INSTRUCTOR…” statement at the end of this exercise should probably be turned into a checkpoint, and we should add a deliverable after the checkpoint that says that the completed dtmfdial.m file should be included in the final lab report
  • I tend to get a lot of questions from students when they’re coding their encoders, so it might be helpful if there was a checkpoint before they started that prompts them to kind of talk through their plans with the TA? Not necessary but something that might be helpful
• 5.2 #1: the parenthetical statement should maybe be turned into a “NOTE” so that the text of the instruction isn’t too long
• 5.2 #1: “Include a printout of these plots in your lab report” should be turned into a deliverable
• 5.2 #2: “For which tones do you expect a large correlation for each key (1, 5, and 9)? Are your results what you expect?” should be moved to the end of the instruction and turned into a checkpoint
• 5.2 #2: again, the instruction to include plots in the lab report should be turned into a deliverable
• 5.2 #3: again, there should be a checkpoint and a deliverable at the end of this instruction. the checkpoint can probably just address the questions “What do you observe? Why does this happen?”, and the deliverable can prompt them to include a zoomed-in plot in their lab report and also to write up a description of what they observed about the correlation plots in general (i.e. to answer the questions posed in the previous two checkpoints)
• There should also be a checkpoint and a deliverable after 5.2 #4 I think, replacing the bolded and/or italicized text
• 5.2 #5 reads like a paragraph intro to an exercise more so than an instruction, and the instructions following feel like a separate exercise from what the students were just doing - I think it might help the lab flow better if we ended exercise #2 after step 4 and began a third exercise afterward (of which the current #6 would be the first step)
• 5.2 #6: I think this step could be split up into two instructions: one that contains the first two sentences (load simple_corr.mdl) and another that asks them to build the intermediate steps
  • in this case, also, I think it would be helpful to move the current last sentence in #6 to the beginning of the second instruction and to move the text from sentence 3 till the second-to-last sentence after, potentially as a sub-bullet or a note
• I also think we could add a checkpoint after #6 to let TAs check in with students just using the SinWave input
• 5.2 #7: it’s not totally clear that the DSP Sine Wave block is replacing the From Workspace, maybe if “Use the” were changed to “Replace the Signal From Workspace block with a”
• The bolded text after 5.2 #8 should be turned into a checkpoint
• 5.2 #10: I think we can remove the parenthetical “(you will need to do this in your lab report)” and instead add a checkpoint afterward that has them discuss how the algorithm works with their TA and then a deliverable that prompts them to write it up
• I think we could also add a checkpoint and a deliverable at the end of the exercise 2 (after #12). the second-to-last bullet point in section 6.3 can be incorporated into those
• for section 6, I think the sequence of things to do before leaving should maybe be incorporated into the instructions, maybe as a separate subsection
• also, we might want to delete "(one per group)" from the last sentence before 6.1, since generally students are expected to turn in individual lab reports
• 6.3 same thought as with lab 3, since we’re transferring over to the checkpoint/deliverable format, it might be more straightforward to write something like “Answer all questions posed in deliverables (1-N)”
• And, again, same comment about “Each group should turn in ONE report.” I’ll stop noting this from now on, but it should apply in general I think

Lab 5

v1->v2 recommendations

• section 1, sentence 2: we haven’t really been using the \circledR symbol with MATLAB in past labs - is that something we want to do consistently?
• section 3, this section doesn’t really fit the formatting used in other labs - could it be incorporated into a different section (maybe the instructions?)
  • Also though if we want to pursue having them submit files on gradescope, we might need to update this section accordingly
• section 4 first paragraph, second to last sentence and last sentence: should we add “2D” in front of “arrays” to make that clear? I think it becomes especially important when you’re talking about RGB
• right now the background, examples, and exercises are all very intertwined, which I think is good for narrative continuity but does make it easier for students to get lost and/or confused about what they’re supposed to turn in
  • one potential fix to this that I think could be good is for us to draw a separation between background/examples and exercises, and we could make a pre-lab assignment to work through the background/examples and turn in some kind of results from running the examples, and then the current “exercises” turn into subsections under an “Instructions” section after “Background”
    • This would also give them a chance to get familiarized with the style of submission we want for this lab
  • I’ll review the rest of the lab kind of with that at the back of my mind, so comments won’t be focused on the overall structure of the document, rather on the smaller things with the assumption that this idea applies to all of it
  • The other option that occurs to me would be to limit the background to just the more theoretical portions and to move the “examples” into the instructions for the lab, in which case they would need to be broken up more, but I think this would limit the usefulness of both the background and the examples, so I strongly prefer the first option
• Is there a specific reason why section 4.1 starts on a new page, and not right after the first paragraph of section 4?
• If we want to make background/examples pre-lab: should be a pre-lab deliverable after each example
  • If not, I think we should add a checkpoint after each example that prompts the students to show their TA the output of the code
• same comment with the \clearpage before 4.3. I feel like it kind of interrupts the flow of reading to abruptly move to the next page, unless we’re starting each subsection on its own page (somewhat even then, but better)
  • same applies before example 5, before section 5, before example 7, before exercise 4, before section 6, before exercise 5, before example 12, and before exercise 8
  • In general, I think it makes sense to clearpage between sections like “Background,” “Instructions,” “Assignment,” etc. but between subsections it can be somewhat disruptive
• section 4.3 sentence 1: “to not only adjust” should be changed to “to adjust not only”
• 4.3 sentence 2: should be “red, green, and blue” (not “a blue”)
• 4.3 sentence 3: insert “to” before “3 times as much”
• 4.3 in the two paragraphs after the code snippet, verbs should be changed to be in the present tense (having them in the future tense is confusing I think because students should be following along and, thus, should have already run the code)
  • For example in the second sentence of the first paragraph, “The rad value will be used” should be changed to “The rad value is used”
• Also this is kind of just a point of personal preference, but in the same sentence, I think it might look better to use $\times$ instead of “2*rad”
• At the end of each exercise: we should insert a deliverable that prompts them to save their code and the produced images (we should probably explicitly list each thing they should have saved here and (in doing so) reiterate the correct titles for the files) and to discuss whatever is currently asked of them in each exercise
• If we modify the exercises to incorporate them into instructions, they should be reformatted from paragraph-style prompts into numbered instructions
  • I’m including a brief example of an option for how that could look for the first few steps of exercise 1, but that’s just an idea - any adjustments needed can be made to the content of the instructions, but I think the general style being more broken up will help with readability and to reduce confusion
  • And, in general, this applies to anything we put in the instructions section
• section 5 first paragraph sentence 2: insert a comma before “with the row and column index…”
• for example 6, if this is turned into a pre-lab deliverable, I think we should have something prompting some kind of explanation of the output, or rephrasing of the step-by-step explanation written in the manual, rather than just relaying the output
  • alternatively, we could add a checkpoint into exercise 3 that has students discuss how the exercise used convolution/how convolution looks within the context of MATLAB with their TA
• example 7, paragraph before y(n) equation, first and second sentences: remove last close-parentheses in (N_h - 2)/2) and (N_h - 1)/2)
• last sentence before the equation, insert “the” or “that the” before “convolution being performed”
• exercise 3 last paragraph sentence 2: “overlays” currently repeated, can delete one of them
• exercise 4 parenthetical “rather than the current value of Change Me” is missing a close-parenthesis
• exercise 4 last sentence: insert a comma before “but you may…”
• section 6.1: the Note should be bolded to match formatting in other labs, and “Note” should be written “NOTE”
  • Also the second colon in the sentence should be turned to a period, and “First” can be added to the next sentence to make it clear that the two are connected
  • And there should be a comma inserted before “and the website”
• exercise 5 sentence 6: insert a comma before “and you will also upload”
• example 9 last sentence: insert a comma before “and those must”
• example 10 sentence 3: add a close-parenthesis at the end of “(due to using the `valid' option"
• exercise 7: if this is switched into instruction format, checkpoints should be added after the initial gaussian blur, then after the two prewitt operators, and then at the end
• exercise 8: conditioned on the same thing, checkpoints would be good I think after they display the original image, after the gaussian and box blurs (show TA both blurs and discuss the differences between the two, this would be followed by a deliverable), and at the end
• section 7: do we want to retain the fact that this assignment isn’t in the format of a lab report? If so, I think it might be good to rephrase this section in terms of deliverables, rather than code and images and questions (easier to keep track of)

Lab 6

v1->v2 recommendations

• section 3 paragraph 3 sentence 4: insert “at” before “quantization effects”
• also I think that the parentheses in paragraph 3 aren’t strictly necessary
• section 3 last paragraph sentence 1: “and therefore aliasing may occur” should be changed to “and, therefore, if aliasing might occur” to agree with the earlier clause
• section 3 last paragraph sentence 2: insert a comma before “and you”
• section 4 in the first bullet point there’s no oxford comma but in the second bullet point there is, we should probably pick one variant and stick with it for consistency
• 5.1 image of simulink system: if possible, image quality should be higher
• 5.1 #2 is a really large block of text with important information but no actual instruction, so I think maybe we could consider moving that and the figure to above #1? It could be a paragraph that introduces the model and explains how the blocks work, and then #1 would instructs students to load the model, and then the current #3 would become #2
  • also to match formatting from previous lab, the “Note” should be un-italicized and then bolded, and “Note” should be in all-caps
• 5.1 #3 should be un-bolded and un-italicized, and I think we should add a checkpoint and a deliverable afterwards that replaces sentence 2
• 5.1 #5: I don’t think the last sentence necessarily needs to be bolded?
• 5.1 #6: the parentheses around “to see the frequency domain signal” can be removed I think
• 5.1 #6: I think the last two sentences (and similarly the bolded/italicized parts of 6, 7, and 8) can be removed, and all of these can be replaced by deliverables after each number
• I think there should also be a checkpoint before #9 which prompts students to discuss their results from 6, 7, and 8 and to explain how they inform their hypothesis about what the max frequency that will pass through the system with no aliasing is to the TA, and then #9 should just ask them to test that (”Verify your answer by…”). this can be followed by a deliverable after 9 asking them to report results
• 5.1 #10 “From Multimedia File” should probably be bolded, and similarly “audio device reader” should be capitalized and bolded
• Can also add a checkpoint and deliverable after 5.1 #10
• 5.2: like in 5.1, I think it might be good to move the big paragraph about how the model works to the top, before the instructions start
• 5.2 #1 long paragraph sentences 3-4: Audio Device Reader should be bolded
• 5.2 #1 same paragraph sentence 10: should be “sending the signal to the Audio Device Writer” not “Audio Device Reader”
  • same sub should be made in sentence 11
• 5.2 #1 the bolded and italicized parts at the end of the long paragraph should be turned into a checkpoint and a deliverable
• I think the questions in 5.2 #3 and #4 can be combined into a checkpoint and a deliverable after #4
• And there should be a checkpoint before #5 that’s similar to the one I suggested before #9 in 5.1
  • followed by a deliverable after #5
• 5.2 #6 sentence 1: “From Multimedia File” should be bolded
• The bolded and italicized parts at the end of #6 and making up #7 should be turned into a checkpoint and a deliverable
• 5.3 #1: I think this instruction could maybe be broken up so that the first sentence is the main body of the instructions, and then the next two are subbulleted
• 5.3 #2: the instruction to plot signals and include things in the lab manual should be converted into a deliverable. There should also probably be a checkpoint before that
• section 6: I think we could probably delete the sentence that’s before 6.1 — since that’s generally standard practice in the 280 labs right now, I don’t think reiterating it in lab 6, especially since we haven't really been saying it explicitly in most of the other labs, is necessary
• 6.3: Like the other labs, I think this could be changed to just say respond to all the deliverables

Lab 7

v1->v2 recommendations

• section 3: similar comment to that from lab 5, this might need to be adjusted if we want to pursue setting up a way to submit files on gradescope, also in general doesn’t fit into the standardized formatting
• GENERALLY: this lab runs into a similar issue as lab 5 did with the formatting, i.e. the lab seems to be primarily sectioned into topics, rather than background, introduction, etc. with topics/exercises as subsections
  • I think that the best way to adjust this, so that the lab content is easier for students to follow, is to section the main body of content into “background” and “instructions,” where “background” contains detailed explanations of each topic, as well as the corresponding examples, and “instructions” contains the exercises. Working through the examples could then be a pre-lab, while the main lab deliverables are the ones associated with the exercises
• if we do decide to format the exercises more as subsections of “instructions,” it would probably be useful to also break the content of each one up into numbered instructions, as opposed to having them in paragraphs
• Exercises 1 and 2: should add a deliverable after each one prompting students to save their code to be submitted
• example 4 sentence 2: “a M” should be changed to “an M” I think
• example 4a sentence 1: I think this sentence should maybe be changed to a “NOTE” and moved?
• 8.1 sentence 3: “for purposes this lab” should be changed to “for the purposes of this lab”
• example 7 sentence 1: it feels sort of weird to me that “filter” is in between “frequency content” and “filtered frequency content” in the list here, I think it might read better if “filter” were moved either to before both or after both
  • same thing in example 8 sentence 1 and example 9 sentence 1
• exercises 3 and 4: the last few sentences of each exercise should be turned into deliverables that ask for the images and for the writeup of what happens as the radius of the filter is changed
• should be a deliverable (or deliverables? depending on how things are broken up into numbers) in exercise 5 that prompts students to write up a description of how the last figures change, and to submit figures 6 and 7
• exercise 6 sentence 1: here right now “Example 8” is written, but earlier (in exercise 5 sentence 1) it says “EXERCISE 4,” but in the lab itself both are written in all-caps. I don’t think both references necessarily need to be in all-caps, but I think they should be consistent in their capitalization
• also should be a deliverable in exercise 6 to write up how the image changes and to submit the 10 images
  • same thing for exercise 7, and exercise 8 (in general all the exercises, I’m going to stop commenting on it but it applies generally I think)
  • also I think we should probably insert deliverables that prompt students to submit their code. If the exercises are formatted as instructions, this could look like a numbered instruction saying something like “Save the code written for this exercise as <INSERT NAME HERE>” followed by a deliverable that asks them to submit the file
• exercise 8 first sentence: again, the formatting for “Exercise 5” here is different than “Example 8” in exercise 6 and “EXERCISE 4” in exercise 5. I don’t think it matters exactly what that formatting is, but I think they should probably all be the same
  • also should delete “the” before “Exercise 5”
• exercise 8, “Note”: I think I noted this in my comments on some of the other labs, but earlier in the semester, notes were bolded, and “note” was written in all-caps (”NOTE:”). I think either all of the notes moving forward should be updated to match that, or the earlier ones should be changed
• section 11: this might need to be rephrased slightly if we put deliverables and things into the body of the lab report, but I think that’ll help with some common student confusion about what exactly they should be doing for the lab report
• section 12: I think if we add a background section to put all of the information and examples into, “hints” could maybe be a subsection of background? That way also students see it before they get into all of the MATLAB code

Lab 8

v1->v2 recommendations

• section 1: this paragraph feels very long and somewhat intimidating, I think it might help to insert a paragraph break before “In class, we have talked about…”
• section 4: this isn’t absolutely necessary, but it might be good to specify exactly what cables students will need. I know some students like to get everything they’re going to need for the lab at the beginning based on the “equipment needed” section, so they might want exact guidelines
• section 5 sentence 1: insert comma before “each of which”
• 5.1 #1: students with a Mac won’t have a C: drive, I think we could just remove that and make it “Open MATLAB, navigate to the directory in which you want to save files, and start Simulink” or even just “Open MATLAB, navigate to the appropriate directory, and start Simulink” (I feel like it’s safe to assume that they have a preferred “appropriate directory” by lab 8)
• 5.1 #3: If I remember correctly, block names were bolded and the first letter of each word was capitalized in previous labs? Might be good to change “DIGITAL FILTER DESIGN” to match that, both in #3 and #4
  • Also the path to find it in the current version of Matlab (2024a) is DSP System Toolbox → Filtering → Filter Designs. The parenthetical and also the screenshot below #3 should be updated to match this
  • Same thing also with “Audio Device Reader” and “Audio Device Writer”
• I think both #6 and #7 are sort of long and could be broken up to have sub-bullets. I’m including an example of how I’m imagining this might look at the end of 5.1 in the LaTeX file
• 5.1 #6: the “NOTE” should be bolded to match formatting from previous labs
• 5.1 #8 sentence 2: “spectrum analyzer” should be have first letters capitalized since it’s a block.
• 5.1 #9: the italicized questions should be turned into a deliverable
• 5.1 #10: I don’t entirely see the purpose of this instruction? Aside from the direction to have the TA check the student’s understanding, but I think that if we turn that into a checkpoint, we can omit #10
  • regardless, that should be turned into a checkpoint I think
• 5.2 #1 I think it might be helpful to insert something at the beginning of this instruction that reminds students that they should be using the same simulink model, just in case that’s not clear
• 5.2 #1: the parenthetical note should be taken out of parentheses and reformatted to look like the other notes throughout the labs
• 5.2 #2: the actual instruction is somewhat buried here; I think it would help to move the first sentence of the second paragraph to the beginning of #2. Also, I think the rest of paragraph 2 might be unnecessary
• 5.2 #3: similar thing here, I think sentences 4-6 should be the first few sentences (”Find the Sine Wave block and add it to your model….”), with context given after.
• 5.2 #4 is a very long block of text that I think students might get lost in. I would break it up in a similar fashion to what I noted for 5.1 #6
• Also, the bolded/italicized sentences in #3, #4, and #5 should be changed to deliverables after each instruction (for #5 this should be all of sentence 3 even though it’s not entirely bolded/italicized).
• “Check your cutoff frequency values with your TA” after 5.2 #5 should be turned into a checkpoint that goes before the corresponding deliverable.
• I think we could put a deliverable after 5.2 #6 that covers the first and second items under “Scrambler” in Results and Discussion (section 6.3)
• Then, after 5.2 #7 we should add a deliverable that covers the third item under “Scrambler” in 6.3
• And finally there should be a deliverable after #8 which covers the fourth item (picture of oscilloscope showing frequency inversion)
• I also think it might be useful to have a checkpoint at the end of 5.2
• I think we could add a deliverable after 5.2 #2 that asks the first four questions under “Descrambler” in 6.3. It seems kind of condensed that way, but I’m not sure where else this would go if we’re trying to have deliverables inline with the instructions
• 5.3 #3 everything but sentence 1 should be turned into a deliverable
• Also, there should be a deliverable at the end of 5.3 which addresses the last bullet point in section 6.3. Maybe we could have a checkpoint before this deliverable to have the student discuss their intuition for this with the TA?
• Section 6 I think we should remove “(one per group)”
• 6.3 if everything here is worked into the form of deliverables, then we don’t necessarily need to have it all listed out here, I think listing everything separately explicitly just gives more opportunity for divergence between versions and confusion from students
• If we wanted, the appendices could probably be worked into the background section? That said, I’m not opposed to having them separate, and I think the information is cool enough that it shouldn’t be left out entirely.