2. Real-time Signals

[Back] The main learning outcomes from this unit are:

• Understand how we analysis time-based signals in the frequency domain.
• Provide an introduction to Fourier Transforms.
• Outline bandwidth requirements.
• Define the capacity of a communications link based on the signal to noise ratio.

Lecture

The lecture covers some fundamental areas of telecomms:

In the lab section we will use some basic Python code to investigate the plotting of some signal patterns, such as square waves, pulses, trianglur, sawtooth, and sine waves, and analyse their frequency response. The main lab tutorial is [here] and there is an outline demo here:

In the tutorial, we will investigate the calculation of link capacity based on signal to noise ratios: [here].

The main things you should have learnt are:

• Able to sketch the waveforms covered in the unit.
• Define that the repeditive waveforms have discrete frequency responses, and non-repeditive ones have continuous frequency responses.
• Calculate the fundamental frequency for a repeditive waveform.
• Understand that repeditive waveforms have harmonic frequency.

Here is a test to check your knowledge [here] and take a fun test [here].

The following is the material from the unit:

• Slides: [PPT][PDF]
• Notes: [PDF]
• Tutorial: [PDF]
• Software Tutorial: [PDF]
• On-line Test: [Here][Here]

The following are a few other links that support the unit:

• Capacity calculator: [Here]
• Signal analyser: [Here]