Vaughn BetzECE 297 Design and Communication. Engineering is Design Much of your training –Analyze how something works But in your career don’t want to.

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Design and Communication

Engineering is Design

• Much of your training– Analyze how something works

• But in your career don’t want to analyze someone elses creation make your own– Design!

• Still need to analyze choices– But design is harder– Requires creativity no one right answer– Requires breadth solve problems that span many

areas

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Design is a Process

• Some flashes of inspiration• But more hard work!• Agile development

– Design approach we’ll use

Vaughn Betz

Test & Evaluate

Refine

Prototype

ECE 297

Communication

• Crucial to your career• Communicate:

– Within your team (informal, fast)– To your management (more formal)– To clients / customers (why should they choose you?)

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Design and Communication: Importance

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

I. Getting a Job

•Your transcript: do you know the basics?•Resume & interview

1. Can you design / problem solve?• On a problem you have not seen before

2. Can you communicate?

•My favourite interview question

What is your proudest design achievement?

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

II. Starting a Company

• Last summer: mentored 2 U of T hatchery students

• Design: smart, heated clothing for skiiers – Many iterations (washable, feedback control, comfortable)

• Communication:– Indiegogo campaign: why do you want this?

– Final pitch: won the $20,000 Lacavera Prize

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

III. Building a Company

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

• Co-founded start-up to create better Computer-Aided Design Tools for FPGAs

• Design: better software– 30x faster (8 hours fifteen minutes)– Circuits ran 38% faster charge twice as much for chips

III. Building a Company

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

• Design: Altera paid $2M for prototype software– Offered ~$10M more to buy company

• Communication: presented to CEO & COO– You have the wrong chips for our software– Let us design the chips & software– Altera will make billions pay us much more than $10 M!

IV. Building a Better World

• Tesla Motors

• Design– Re-imagined & re-designed the electric car

• Communication– Made electric cars cool– tesla battery swap

• Concretely shows how Tesla has overcome a weakness

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Course Goals & Overview

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Course Goals

• Gain experience with engineering design and the design process– Including team-based design

• Enhance your communication skills– Written– Oral

• Learn more complex software development

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

How?

• Lectures will cover principles and key skills– Design (Vaughn Betz) & communication (Ken Tallman)– Course much more difficult if you don’t attend!

• Deeper learning is through doing– Develop a complex C++ software application

• In a team of 3• Four major development milestones

– Communicate effectively• 2 written documents• 2 oral presentations

– The more effort you put in, the more you’ll learn

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Design Project: Mapping Application

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Mentoring and Evaluation

• Detailed grade breakdown in syllabus– 50% on design / coding (communication helps!)– 50% on communication (helped by a good design!)– No midterm or final exam

• Mentored by a TA– Engineering grad student– Represents engineering manager, evaluates design

• Mentored by a CI– Communications Instructor– Represents client / project manager, evaluates

communication

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Major Milestones

• Milestone 1: choose / code data structures• Written Doc 1: graphics proposal• Milestone 2: graphics• Oral 1: graphics presentation• Milestone 3: find paths• Milestone 4: courier company route• Written Doc 2: Final Report• Oral 2: Final Presentation

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

First Two Weeks

• Learn key software tools (milestone 0)– Show a TA you know how to use them– 2% of final grade, done individually– Labs start today!– Going through the tools / tutorials fully will help you

greatly during the project

• You will work on the ECE ug machines– Login is your utorid– Initial password is your student number– Change password with passwd right away!– Can work remotely using vnc

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

By Third Week (Monday, Jan. 19)

• Have to form team of 3– Must be in same lab time slot (not room/section)– Will also be in same tutorial time slot– Choose wisely!

• Same work ethic• Complementary skills• Can get along

– Team selector and list of students per time slot on course web site at www.eecg.utoronto.ca/~vaughn/ece297

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Third Week Onwards• Meet with your TA during your lab time slot

– Every week

– Have written status report, on a wiki page (4% of final mark)

– Get feedback on your design

– Ask for help

– Some weeks: demo your design / be evaluated

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Third Week Onwards

• Meet with your CI at a mutually convenient time – May be during your tutorial time slot– Every week, unless cancelled by CI– Go over written status on your wiki page (another 4%

of mark)– Get feedback on design documents and presentations

as you develop them– Some weeks: will make your oral presentation

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Tutorials

• First 3 weeks: tutorials will teach more advanced C++– Templates– Standard Template Library (STL)

• Some knowledge of STL necessary to complete project– To communicate with the support code we give you

• More knowledge of STL makes project much easier– Can create basic data structures much faster finish program

more quickly

• You should attend!• Friday, 9 – 11 am, GB 412 tutorial is cancelled

– Go to Friday, 9 – 11 am GB 244 tutorial instead

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Academic Integrity

• General discussion is OK, copying is not– All reports will be run through turnitin.com– All code will be run through an automated program similarity

checker– Both copying and allowing copying will be penalized

• The Code of Academic Discipline will be strictly enforced

• “Integrity takes a career to build and a moment to destroy.”– Misha Burich, former CTO of Altera

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Resources & Advice

• Your CI and TA are there to mentor you ask for help!

• Discussion board available on course website– Ask anything, but don’t post code please

• Anytime you find me, you can ask a question– Or email for an appointment

• Don’t fall behind– Milestone 0: due by Friday, Jan. 16 @ 5 pm– Have team chosen by Monday, Jan. 19– Will release milestone 1 next week can start early

Vaughn Betz ECE 297

Feedback• This is a “reboot” of this course

– We want feedback on how it’s going!

• Tell us about any issues / improvements– In person or email– Or by anonymous feedback link on course website

• Mistake bounty– Point out a mistake in a lecture

– 3 mistakes in 1 lecture for everyone next lecture

Vaughn Betz ECE 297