Incorporating practical contents in control engineering courses

Abstract

Two categories of practical curricula contents which are desired but often missing in the control system design courses taught in universities are described. The first encompasses the essential expert's knowledge which is seldom presented in textbooks. Examples are the handling of nonlinearity, multiloop design, consideration of load regulation, and the need for a high sampling rate. The second encompasses emerging practical knowledge from recent research. Examples are the delta operator, autotuning, and knowledge-based control. The viewpoint that academic course designers should adopt a balanced approach to ensure that a sufficient percentage of practical topics is incorporated into the curricula contents is advocated.