Teaching Automatic Control of Engineering Systems Using Open Source CH Control System Toolkit and Web-Based Design and Analysis System

Ch Control System Toolkit (CCST) is a software package for design and analysis of control systems. It is implemented as a class with member functions to run in the user-friendly C/C++ interpreter Ch. Based on the CCST, a Web-based Control System Design and Analysis System (WCDAS) has been developed. In this article, using CCST and WCDAS to teach automatic control of engineering systems is presented. Using CCST, students are able to write programs easily with a few lines of C/C++ code to solve practical engineering problems. By solving control system design and analysis problems in C/C++, the programming skills gained in the course are applicable to other areas of engineering. CCST and WCDAS are open source. Students are able to examine the source code to understand the implementation of theories and algorithms in software. Based on CCST and WCDAS, the Web-based Controller/Compensator Design Module (WCCDM) has also been developed for teaching and student learning. Using these Web-based tools, students can perform design and analysis of control systems interactively through a Web browser remotely. The CCST, WCDAS, and WCCDM have been used to teach an undergraduate course on Automatic Control of Engineering Systems at the University of California, Davis. All software packages and teaching materials for this course are available on the internet. They can be downloaded and modified to teach similar courses with different requirements.