Computer and Software Engineering Students "Hit the Ground Running"

By Robert Ross Computer engineering students in Daytona Beach’s computer system design lab (from left): Jason Firanski,

Flying robots survey debris after a hurricane, spot survivors, and summon other robotic vehicles to the rescue.

Airplanes keep track of each other in the sky, relaying their positions every second to other pilots and ground control.

Office workers stay in shape by going a few aerobic rounds with a boxer punching in real-time as a 3-D graphic image.

Machines are getting very clever – interacting with each other and their users. What makes it all possible are little clusters of software inside them that talk with other software clusters.

“Embedded computer systems are practically everywhere – in TVs, cell phones, iPods, and game controllers,” says Timothy Wilson, professor of computer and software engineering at Embry-Riddle’s Daytona Beach, Fla. campus.

“On modern aircraft and spacecraft, virtually every subsystem -- from navigational and data communication to sensor and cockpit display systems -- has one or more computers,” adds James Lyall, acting chairman of computer and electrical engineering at the university’s Prescott, Ariz. campus.

Machine Vision Lab

Tarek El Dokor, assistant professor
of electrical and computer engineering,
and a team of students in
the Embry-Riddle Machine Vision Lab
at the Prescott campus have created
embedded systems and
software systems for a variety of uses.

For example, the lab has developed
a way for people to control the
movement of video game characters
by moving their own body instead
of a joystick or controller.
A camera captures the person’s
movements, sending messages
through the computer system
that tell on-screen objects or contents
what to do. One can also rotate
or move something on a computer screen
by moving one’s finger a few inches
away from the screen.

The potential applications include
outdoor signage, automobile dashboards,
training programs, “aerobic” video games,
and unmanned aerial vehicles.

For more: Embry-Riddle
Machine Vision Lab.

Meet computer and
software engineering alumni

Students Learn Hardware and Software
At Embry-Riddle’s Florida and Arizona campuses, students are learning to develop, test, and implement computer hardware and software systems for products as diverse as heart pacemakers and helicopters. They focus on products with built-in microprocessors, many of which must respond immediately to critical sensor data. When they graduate, they’ll have their pick of attractive job offers. Surveys by CNN, Money magazine, and the U.S. Department of Labor have ranked software and computer engineering among the fastest-growing and highest-paying careers in the nation from now until 2020.

Embry-Riddle computer and software engineering students learn to design and develop hardware and software for embedded computer systems and real-time applications. Their coursework focuses on programming languages, circuit theory, computer design, embedded control systems, real-time systems, and software engineering.

Working on Teams Is Essential
Starting as freshmen, Embry-Riddle students begin working on teams, developing complex software and hardware systems, an experience that gives them proficiency in teamwork, designing to requirements, and quality assurance.

Working on teams is essential, Wilson says, because “a lot of what engineers do is persuade people to do things.”

"One way of getting into management is by knowing how to recognize and resolve conflict,” says Massood Towhidnejad, professor and chair of computer and software engineering at the Daytona Beach campus. “If someone is paying you $70,000, they expect you to identify the problems and work them out.”

“We treat them like employees,” Towhidnejad says. “They learn to face constraints such as budget, time and weight. For example, they might attach a laptop to a model aircraft, but the plane won’t lift off, so they have to design a computing device that will be light enough.”

Senior Projects: from Helicopter Avionics…
In their senior year, students from computing, software, and other engineering disciplines collaborate for nine months on a complex, real-world project designed to push them beyond what they’ve learned in the classroom. In Prescott, computer engineering students usually execute a project related to the avionics of a helicopter that their campus owns. They also align their work with problems NASA is working on, and the space agency gives them feedback on their requirements document before they start.

Steven Quintero, at Prescott, with a model helicopter

“In our senior design projects, everything must be fully documented, with specs written and signed off on,” says Gary Gear, associate professor of computer and electrical engineering at Prescott. “It’s the way things are done in the aerospace industry.”

For the spring 2007 semester, the seniors designed an ultrasonic altimeter for an unmanned helicopter that can give accurate readings from a couple of inches to 20 feet. A prototype of their altimeter will be attached to the belly of one of NASA’s UAVs and tested next summer.

…To Air and Land Rescue Vehicles
At the Daytona Beach campus, senior computer and software engineering students are continuing work on a multi-year project involving unmanned rescue vehicles. Two years ago, they programmed an autonomous model airplane with a six-foot wingspan to fly from a starting point to a search area and send live video of a possible hurricane victim to the operators.

Last year, students built a ground vehicle the size of a small Mars rover to receive coordinates for a body’s location and command other ground vehicles to go there. The ground vehicles have heat sensors that can determine if the victim is still alive.

This year, seniors are programming the air and ground vehicles to coordinate with each other.

Prepared for the Real World
While most of Embry-Riddle’s computer and software engineering graduates go to work for aerospace employers, many are hired by manufacturers of medical devices like pacemakers and defibrillators, which require the same kind of embedded, real-time, safety-critical software engineering used for aircraft navigation systems.

“Our industry advisory board tells us Embry-Riddle graduates hit the ground running,” Towhidnejad says, “and we’ve noticed they move to technical management positions faster than grads from other schools. It’s because our curriculum is so close to the way industry works every day.”

For more information about our Computer and Software Engineering programs on the Daytona Beach campus or email: behif@erau.edu
on the Prescott campus -- http://www.erau.edu/prescott/engineering/eeced/bce/computer_engineering.html

Learn about "The Embry-Riddle Edge" that gives our computer and software engineering grads career advantages.