Incorporating programming languages in the enhancement of the learning process for sequential logic circuit design

Abstract

Logic circuits can generally be classified into two categories of combinational and sequential logic circuits. In the sequential circuit design, although it is easy to construct a state transition table from state transition diagram, creating an excitation table according to the memory type is a very laborious and time-consuming task. There are several software-based applications and hardware description languages to describe the structure and behavior of electronic circuits. This will take more time and persistence much like learning any other skill. Computer science degrees include courses focused mainly on programming languages. There is a strong case to be made for use of skills acquired in programming courses to shorten the learning curve. Thus, this work proposes a method for the implementation of the circuit incorporating only the state equations of the sequential circuit without dealing with excitation tables. This allows to model the behavior of circuit through buttonbox, checkbox, textbox, etc., which are the basic elements of the graphical user interface-based programming language. A questionnaire was utilized to assess the change in the learning activity of students and perceptions of the proposed method. The results provided that the method was an effective and engaging way of teaching the sequential circuit design.