9451775 Parks The objective of the proposed project is to construct a state-of-the-art software development laboratory which will support three courses in large scale software development with emphasis on manufacturing applications. Learning software engineering concepts is a vital educational experience for modern engineers and this educational experience is largely being ignored in engineering education. Further, engineering students cannot get the appropriate experience by taking just a couple of computer science courses, since most computer science departments (with a few exceptions) focus primarily on algorithm development and database research. In order to correct this deficiency, we are proposing to offer our engineering students three courses in software development with an appropriate laboratory experience. The students will be required to design large software systems illustrating team programming concepts, software maintenance issues, and systems integration principles. This proposal is a joint effort of the Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISE) and the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Departments. The courses will be taught and maintained by faculty from both departments. The planned laboratory will give engineering students experience in the three major software paradigms used in today's manufacturing software development: functional and data modeling, object oriented analysis and design, and real time programming. We plan to expand this experience to all engineering disciplines.
