The Innovative Effects Of Hdl And Fpga On Digital Hardware Design Education In Eet Programs

With the development of computer-aided design and semiconductor technologies, Hardware Description Language (HDL) and Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) have become dominant design and implementation tools for digital hardware and are widely used by both industry and academia. As a result, they will bring many innovative effects on the architectures, contents, and methodologies of digital hardware design courses in Electrical Engineering Technology (EET) programs. In this paper, by comparing in detail the design procedures of three typical digital circuits when the traditional design methodology and the VHDL and FPGA methodology are employed respectively, we will clearly demonstrate those innovative effects of VHDL and FPGA on digital hardware design courses, such as why some traditional skills are outdated and what the newly emerged skills are. From the design procedures of those typical digital circuits, we can conclude that the best way to teach HDL and FPGA in EET programs is to integrate HDL and FPGA into all digital hardware design courses, from entry level to advanced level, rather than open an independent course.