Simulink/Matlab Help

List of Topics

Basics
Notation
Printing
Scope
Handling lots of blocks
Addition Block
Sine and Cosine
Cut and Paste

Using mouse and keyboard(3 pages)

• After the Simulink and ece359lib libraries are open, open a new model through the file menu-option.
• To get a particular block inside the new model, just click and drag it from the block library.
• To connect blocks, click on the starting point of the connection, and drag the line that appears to the end point. To produce branching, Conrol-click on a point on the connection, and drag to the end point.
• To set the parameters of a particular block (eg. frequency of a sine wave generator), double click on it after you have copied it into your model. You can use variable names that have been set in the matlab workspace.
• You can also save the model in a model.mdl file. Use the file menu to do this.

• Commands in typewriter font -- help simulink
• Simulink library names in italics -- Simulink/Linear refers to the main Simulink family of blocks and within it, the Linear blocks
• Notes of caution and crucial hints will be in bold -- Do not take this course lightly !

• To print models, use print from the file menu on the model window. This will open a dialog box similar to the one for printing out plots. Try to give more meaningful names to the blocks. Click on the block name to change it.
• The fourier transformer output can be printed just like an ordinary matlab plot. You may label the plots with hand. To change the title of the plot, just change the name of the fourier transform block. (This feature seems to be giving some trouble, please label your graphs with a pencil if this does not work - Thanks)
• Instructions on printing out the scope output will be posted later (you do not need it for the first experiment)

Scope

• The scope (from simulink/sinks) can be used to look at the signal in time domain. Though it can be used while the simulation is running, doing so can reduce the speed of simulation slightly. Notice that the zoom in and zoom out features of scope are a bit tricky. See documentation in Matlab.
• To take printouts of the scope data you need to store the variables to the workspace. Click the upper right icon on the scope menu. This will open a settings window. Select save to workspace and give the variable name, say m. Then to plot the variable m, use the command
  plot(m(:,1),m(:,2)).
  To look at the time structure of this signal more closely, use
  plot(m(100:200,1),m(100:200,2)).
• To make the onscreen scope display more interesting, try to make the window long. Set the time range of the scope to T_SIM and click on the binocular icon to make the display fit into the frame.
• Looking at both the input and output signals on the scope while the simulation is running gives a good idea of the delay associated with the system
  
• For getting two or more signals on the same plot, save both variables to workspace and then plot them using the matlab plot command.

• Begin your diagram from the lower left of the window. Leaving a wide left margin is also desirable. Reember that you can always expend the bottom and right margins of the figure later, but not the left and top margins.
• When drawing wires that criss cross a lot, try to leave the mouse click while dragging the wire. See what effect this has, it may be helpful if things seem to get cluttered.
• If a connection is left unattached, Matlab gives a warning message on the workspace.
• Keep the wires as small as possible. If your setup is getting too cluttered it is better to start afresh, rather than trying to run wires all over the place.