RECKON – A Reconfigurable Prototyping Kit for Engineering and IT Laboratory Based Courses Eduardo Bezerra 1 , Marianne Pouchet 2 , Michael Paul Gough 3 , Fernando Moraes 4 , Ney Calazans 4 , Augusto Einsfeldt 5 1, 3 Space Science Centre, School of EIT, University of Sussex, England, UK 2 Communications Research Group, School of EIT, University of Sussex, England, UK 1, 4 GAPH Group, Informatics Faculty, Catholic University (PUCRS), Porto Alegre, Brazil 5 AEE Engenharia Eletronica, Joinvile, Brazil {E.A.Bezerra, M.Pouchet, M.P.Gough}@sussex.ac.uk, {moraes, calazans}@inf.pucrs.br, aee@terra.com.br Abstract. This work describes an educational kit developed at the University of Sussex, UK. The kit is based on reconfigurable computing technology, targeting its use in different laboratory based courses, with minimal modifications of the hardware components. The paper describes the software and hardware modules of the system, and the main stages of the project. Keywords. Reconfigurable Computing, Rapid Prototyping of Digital Systems 1. Introduction Putting into practice the concepts taught in technological courses is an essential complement to a good understanding of the theory. The constant changes and advances in technology, result in challenges that universities and technical colleges have to deal with to keep their laboratories updated. The managers of modern courses in this highly competitive market have to find ways to provide students and tutors with appropriate tools, taking into consideration the usually modest available budget. A prototyping kit based on reconfigurable computing technology is a suggestion for the solution of this problem. This solution has been implemented at the University of Sussex, UK, and is used in one module of the Data Communications course for MSc. students at the School of Engineering and Information Technology. The implementation of the project has become feasible due to the falling costs of large Field Programmable Gate-Arrays (FPGAs) devices, which are the most widely used components in the design of reconfigurable computers. The students use a tool (user interface), developed according to the course requirements, to observe and to control the execution of their experiments on the prototyping boards. It is important to highlight here that, depending on the course, the use of reconfigurable computing technology is completely transparent to the students. For example, in the Data Communications module the goal is to teach protocols and standards for instance RS-232 and RS-485, and to show how to program and use a traditional USART. In this case the students do not even have to know about the existence of the FPGA on the prototyping board. In other situations as in a “VHDL for synthesis” course or in a hardware/software co-design course, additional tools such as commercial synthesis can be used by the students to generate configurations for the FPGA. The main objective of this paper is to introduce to the Reconfigurable Computing community some of the features of the prototyping kit developed at Sussex. The paper is