Elizabeth Forrest Curry | 2025 I.S. Symposium

Name: Elizabeth Forrest Curry
Title: Circuits to Software: An Exploration of Computing Development in Three Stages
Major: Computer Science
Minor: Mathematics
Advisor: Dan Palmer

This work aims to illustrate the connections between digital logic, circuitry, and modern software. To do this, I selected a puzzle game to use as a driving problem. I create three implementations of this puzzle. I start with an implementation that contains only physical computing components utilizing no processor or software, representing early implementations of digital logic. The next is a physical implementation with an Arduino that has a processor and uses software to receive and give inputs and outputs. The last is a software implementation made with Python to show where computing is now. The basics of digital logic and electronics are necessary to create the circuit implementation. Linear Algebra and Finite State Automata describe the game and show the functionality shared between the implementations. Through this project I show a subsection of how computing has developed from fixed circuits into complex modern technology.

Posted in Symposium 2025 on May 1, 2025.