Controls Education Using Matlab: Tutorials on the World-WideWeb

本研究旨在改善本科控制工程教育。学生经常在学习控制方面有困难；它通常是学生必须以复杂的方式使用复杂变量的性质和线性代数基础的第一门学科。建议的教学辅助工具将说明控制系统的设计和分析，并使学生能够快速使用呈现给他们的知识。我们将使用Matlab（一种流行的计算和可视化软件包）和万维网（WWW）为本科水平的控制课程开发有用的、广泛可用的、易于访问的教程。这些教育辅助将是任何大学本科工程课程的宝贵补充。这些教程的原型可以在WWW上查看http://www.engin.umich.edu/~tilbury/matlab_tutorial.html。这些教育辅助工具的主要创新是它们在WWW上的实现。教程将结合解释性文本与示例Matlab命令和说明性的情节和图形。本教程的大纲将密切遵循本科控制课程中最流行的教科书大纲，包括建模、拉普拉斯变换、时域和频域关系、根轨迹方法、频域方法、状态空间方法和数字控制。分析技术，如确定的稳定性和稳态误差的控制系统将纳入整个教程。教程将包含详细计算的示例问题，展示所有必要的步骤，以及供学生独立工作的示例问题。对于这些示例问题，将包含几个级别的提示。在这个项目中，采用的方法在教授学生如何使用Matlab进行控制系统设计方面有三个优点。首先，全国各地的学生都可以立即免费获得这些教程。任何学生都可以通过Mosaicing或Netscape“3”访问WWW，也可以在个人计算机或工作站上访问Matlab，在运行Matlab时可以遵循教程，并且可以轻松地在两个程序之间切换。其次，学生将能够以“边看边做”的方式掌握关键概念和设计技术。教程中显示的命令可以从Netscape或Mosaic窗口复制并粘贴到Matlab命令窗口中，只需单击鼠标即可；不需要耗时的打字和编辑。学生可以立即看到实际计算的结果，将其与教程中显示的结果进行比较，并通过修改代码和更改参数快速进行实验。第三，通过在WWW上使用超文本标记语言，所提出的在线教育辅助工具可以高度互联。在教程中会有几个路径，它们具有不同的复杂程度或强调不同的方法。通过在WWW上提供教育辅助工具，它们不仅可以很容易地整合到传统四年制大学现有的本科控制课程中，而且还可以被社区学院、行业和个人用于继续教育。通过我们将开发的教育辅助工具，学术界和工业界的工程师可以轻松访问WWW，并且目前知道一些经典控制理论，可以学习如何使用Matlab来应用他们的知识并提高他们的技能和理解。

The objective of this project is to improve undergraduate controls engineering education. Students frequently have difficulties in learning controls; it is often the first subject in which they must use the properties of complex variables and the fundamentals of linear algebra in a sophisticated manner. The proposed education aids will illustrate control system design and analysis and enable students to quickly use the knowledge presented to them. We will develop useful, widely available, and easily accessible tutorials for undergraduate-level controls courses using Matlab, a popular computation and visualization software package, and the World Wide Web (WWW). These education aids would be a valuable addition to the undergraduate engineering curriculum at any university. Prototypes of these tutorials can be viewed on the WWW at http://www.engin.umich.edu/~tilbury/matlab_tutorial.html. The main innovation of these education aids is their implementation on the WWW. The tutorials will combine explanatory text with sample Matlab commands and illustrative plots and graphics. The outline of the tutorials will closely follow the outline of the most popular textbooks for undergraduate controls courses, including modeling, Laplace transforms, time-domain and frequency-domain relationships, root-locus methods, frequency-domain methods, state-space methods, and digital control. Analysis techniques such as determining the stability and steady-state error of a control system will be incorporated throughout the tutorials. The tutorials will contain example problems which are worked out in detail, showing all of the necessary steps, and sample problems for the students to work on independently. For these sample problems, several levels of hints will be included. There are three advantages to the approach taken in this project for teaching students how to use Matlab for control system design. First, the tutorials will be immediately available to students across the country at no cost to them. Any student with access to both the WWW through Mosaicing or Netscape "3" and to Matlab on either a personal computer or a workstation will be able to follow a tutorial while running Matlab and will be able to easily switch between the two programs. Second, students will be able to grasp key concepts and design techniques in a "learn by seeing and doing" manner. Commands shown in the tutorials can be copied from the Netscape or Mosaic window and pasted into the Matlab command window with a simple point and click of the mouse; there is no need for time-consuming typing and editing. Students can immediately see the result of an actual computation, compare it to the result shown on the tutorial, and quickly experiment with modifications of the code and changes of parameters. Third, by using the hypertext markup language on the WWW, the proposed on-line education aids can be highly interconnected. There will be several paths through a tutorial which have different levels of complexity or which emphasize different methods. By making the education aids available on the WWW, not only will they be easily integrated into an existing undergraduate controls curriculum in a traditional four-year university, but they could also be used by community colleges, industry, and individuals for continuing education. With the education aids which we will develop, it will be easy for engineers in academia and industry with access to the WWW and who currently know some classical control theory to learn how to use Matlab to apply their knowledge and to improve their skills and understanding.