A general purpose dataflow digital signal processing environment for education using python

Digital signal processing is one of the most important foundations in electrical engineering studies and other related fields. Many educational institutions use computer software as educational tools for their digital signal processing courses. However most of the available software is usually focused on advanced features and have many details that can confuse many beginners. This work proposes a general purpose digital signal processing software which is focused on the educational applications in introductory level digital signal processing courses. The software is implemented on the concept of dataflow programming, a user can create a signal processing circuit by connecting block diagrams of the pre-created modules through the graphical user interface. When the circuit is operating, the signal will be streaming through the circuit with the defined buffer size and sampling rate. The parameters of each block diagram can be changed while the circuit is operating and the changes will be responded in real-time. A waveform scope and a spectrum analyzer are provided for visualizing the signal at a certain point in the circuit. The software is designed with minimalist philosophy. With its simplicity, students can understand what actually happens from the block diagram level to the mathematical operator level. A few sample applications are demonstrated in the paper as guidelines of how the software might be used in the practical applications.