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The Course
The Course
What is a switch? At its simplest, it's a mechanism that forces the world into one of two states — on or off, yes or no, 0 or 1. From the abacus to the transistor to the neuromorphic chips being developed in labs at Boise State, that simple idea has transformed how humans compute, communicate, and organize the world.
Switch is a general-education, lab-based course for all majors that traces that history and brings it into the present. Over fifteen weeks, students work with historical computing artifacts, explore mechanical and electrical switching systems, and then step into active semiconductor research laboratories at Boise State University to see where that history is headed.
Curriculum: below are the materials for lab (a weekly prelab, lab, and postlab homework).
Week 1: Switch as a noun
By establishing some rules for on/off, we can store numbers as a state. This is the first "switch" of the course: abacus bead as a switch.
Week 2: Switch as a verb
Switches can switch switches. This often requires continuous movements to become discrete movements, as in mechanical adding machines.
Week 3*: Switches everywhere
Switches aren't just for manipulating numbers. A range of artifacts are built via a set of yes/no decisions. We examine cloth, a precursor to modern computers.
Week 4: Switch as noun & verb
Switches can be linked together in a range of ways to perform increasingly complex functions.
Week 5: Switches as logic
There are some ways of putting together these switches that are exteremly useful (e.g., logic gates). These become the fundamental building blocks of many other machines.
Week 6: Logic as Pong!
Those simple decisions are almost all you need to create very complex things, like games.
Week 8: Electrical switches
To make electrical switches, we need something that can be "on" or "off" for current flow. We'll examine early methods. Bonus: these are switches that switch switches!
Week 9: Switches that stay still
... but the search was on for how to make a more robust switch, with no moving parts. These were made first from germanium and then silicon.
Week 10: Recent developments
Before visiting the labs at Boise State that are advancing this technology, we'll explore some developments since the advent of silicon.
Week 11: Neuro-morphic computing
How is research at BSU furthering this work?
Week 12: Light switches
...
Class apps: below are interactive online apps you will need in class.
The original switch, used for arithmetic.
If computers designed the abacus.
Mechanical methods of arithmetic.
On/off as up/down. 0/1 as warp/weft.
A reconfigurable mechanical computer.
The 1970's computer game.
The 0/1 decisions that make up the computer game.
An analogy for how continuous signals become discrete.
Listen to the various parts of Pong turn from zero (silent) to 1 (tone).
Class media
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 2514716. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
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