Web technology for controls education

This paper describes the authors' development of software to use the WWW for controls education. A tutorial concept was developed for teaching controls to students through the use of Matlab, a popular computation and visualization software package. The Controls Tutorials for Matlab illustrate control system design and analysis and enable students to quickly use the knowledge presented to them. Currently this web-based tutorial concept is being extended to controls laboratory experiments and equipment. The goal of these Laboratory Web-assistants is to make students more self-reliant in the laboratory and to shift, the role of instructors from lab technician to coach Both the Controls Tutorials and the Web-assistants provide students with useful information from diverse sources when and where they need it. This paper discusses the objectives, structure, implementation, and utility of the software and our experience with students.