A first year, VHDL based, digital electronics course

Abstract

Most classical digital electronics textbooks have addressed the design with hardware description languages (HDL) as an addition to the traditional curricula. This is true, due that the design of digital circuits and the HDL specification are not taught simultaneously, but separated through time. Usually both are studied in different courses. The goal of this paper is to present a novel approach that simultaneously performs the introduction to digital electronics with the introduction to the specification of circuits using the VHDL language. In addition, the course is designed for the Telecommunications Program first year (Spring) with option in telematics, such that the previous knowledge of the students is reduced to a fundamental course in electrical circuits.