BLACKBOARD-BASED DIGITAL HARDWARE DESIGN USING FPGAS

One of the challenges that still remain to deal with in distance learning is how to teach an experimentally intensive course in engineering. An example is a digital hardware design course, taught to the electrical engineering students. Here the students need to have access to both software and hardware tools necessary to practice design, synthesize, implement and test their digital circuits in the classroom environment. The problem can simply be stated as follows: How the students of a hardware design class can continuously interact with the hardware facilities and the equipment without physically moving to the lab? This problem becomes even more challenging when the class is held off campus, where for the most part, the hardware designs facilities cannot be moved to the location.