For my Systems and control product i thought how i could create a systems approach for my Christmas product.Taking into account the knowledge I have acquired up to this point I wanted my product to flash coloured lights in various sequences.The basic 'Questions' I found in earlier research were helpful in working out what I wanted to do. If I had approached doing this task without the earlier research I wouldn't have known where to start. Im still a little nervous about this project however i feel confident about creating my program and working out my 'system' ...i think im more worried about actually making my circuit and all the bits that come with it!..EKK!!!
Ive started to put together simple programs on picaxe programmer using the flow chart as its pretty similar functions to FLOWOL which is what i wanted to achieve as a next step. I wouldn't say i have learnt anything different in terms of input-process-output but has given me a chance to see the different languages which can be used to represent this process. On Picaxe you can 'convert to basic' which helped me to understand coding and this wasn't as scary as i initially thought. I could clearly follow what was happening in the program.
For my Systems and control project I have to create my own little program! and need to think about the systems approach I will be taking in my circuit.
In a session today we started using FLOWOL to create a digital system which was a great way to start working with a systems approach. I found Flowol a little difficult to understand at first (even thought its apparently used in primary schools!?). when looking at it purely as a set of commands I couldn't really understand what was going on or off and what input and output were relating to and what I was asking the instructions to do?
To help me figure this out I tried to apply it to physical things which helped get my head around what I was asking the programme to do. I then started to apply it to a circuit with components such as LED'S and switches (see image below). Thinking of input 1 as a switch and output as a LED ..."IS THE SWITCH ON?....YES SO TURN THE LIGHT ON.....ACTUALLY NO ITS NO SO TURN THE LIGHT OFF" I was again pretty correct about what a systems approach meant in relation to a circuit But need to explore this further. we had a quick look at 'basic' and pickaxe programmer whoever that just seemed like a step too far for my little brain today. |