Acknowledgments

I started my graduate studies at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, USA, in January 1991. My area of specialization was digital signal processing. At the institute most of the core courses in signal processing were taught by teachers who had authored textbooks on the subjects. Dr Ronald W. Schafer taught “digital signal processing” using Discrete Time Signal Processing by Oppenheim, Schafer and Buck. Dr Monson H. Hayes taught “advanced signal processing” using his book, Statistical Digital Signal Processing and Modeling. Dr Vijay K. Madisetti taught from his book, VLSI Digital Signal Processing, and Dr Russell M. Mersereau taught from Multi Dimensional Signal Processing by Dudgeon and Mersereau. During the semester when I took a course with Dr Hayes, he was in the process of finalizing his book and would give different chapters of the draft to students as text material. I would always find my advisor, Dr Madisetti, burning the midnight oil while working on his new book.

The seed of desire to write a book in my area of interest was sowed in my heart in those days. After my graduation I had several opportunities to work on real projects in some of the finest engineering organizations in the USA. I worked for In gersoll Rand, Scientific Atlanta, Picture Tel and Cisco Systems. I returned to Pakistan in January 1997 and started teaching in the Department of Computer Engineering at the College of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering (E&ME), National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST), while I was still working for Cisco Systems.

In September 1999, along with two friends in the USA, Raheel Ahmed Khan and Sherjil Ahmed, founded a startup company called Communications Enabling Technologies (or CET, later named Avaz Networks Inc. USA). Raheel Khan is a genuine designer of digital systems. Back in 1999 and 2000,we designed afew systems and technical discussions with him further increased my liking and affection, along with strengthening my comprehension of the subject. I was serving as CTO of the company and also heading the R&D team in Pakistan.

In 2001 we secured US$17 million in venture funding and embarked on developing what was at that time the highest density media processor system-on-chip (MPSoC) solution for VoIP carrier-class equipment. The single chip could process 2014 channels of VoIP, performing DTMF generation and detection, line echo cancellation (LEC), and voice compression and decompression on all these channels. I designed the top-level architecture of the chip and all instruction set processors, and headed a team of 160 engineers and scientists to implement the system. Designing, implementing and testing such a complex VLSI system helped me to understand the intricacies of the field of digital design. We were able to complete the design cycle in the short period of10months.

At the time we were busy in chip designing, I, with my friends at Avaz also founded the Center for Advanced Studies in Engineering (CASE), a postgraduate engineering program in computer engineering. I introduced the subject of “advanced digital design” at CASE and NUST. I would always teach this subject, and to compose the course contents I would collect material from research papers, reference books and the projects we were undertaking at Avaz. However, I could not find a book that did justice to this emerging field.

So it was in 2002 that I found myself compelled to write a textbook on this subject. In CASE all lectures are recorded on videos for its distance-learning program. I asked Sandeela Sameem, my student and an intern at Avaz, to make a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation from the design I drew and text I wrote on the whiteboard. These presentations served as the initial material for me to start writing the book. The course was offered once every year and in that semester I would write a little on a few topics, and would give the material to my students as reference.

In 2004, I with my core team of CET founded a research organization called the Center for Advanced Research in Engineering (CARE) and since its inception I have been managing the organization as CEO. At CARE, I have had several opportunities to participate in the design of machine vision, network analysis and digital communication systems. The techniques and examples discussed in this book are usedin the award winning products from CARE. Software Defined Radio, 10 Gigabit VoIP monitoring system and Digital Surveillance equipment received APICTA (Asia Pacific Information and Communication Alliance) awards in September 2010 for their unique and effective designs.

My commitments as a professor at NUST and CASE, and as CEO of CARE did not allow me enough time to complete my dream of writing a book on the subject but my determination did not falter. Finally in March of 2008 I forwarded my proposal to John Wiley and Sons. In July 2008, I formally started work on the book.

I have been fortunate to have motivated students to help me in formatting the text and drawing the figures. Initially it was my PhD student, Fozia Noor Khan, who took pains to put the material in a good format and convert my hand-drawnfigures into Visio images. Later this task was taken over by Hussnain Ali. He also read the text and highlighted areas that might needmyattention. Finallyit was my assistant, Shaista Zainab, who took over helping me in putting the manuscript in order. Also, many of my students helped in exploring areas. Among them were Zaheer Ahmed, Mohammad Mohsin Rahmatullah, Sheikh M. Farhan, Ummar Farooq and Rizwana Mehboob, who completed their PhDs under my co-supervision or supervision. There are almost 70 students who worked on their MS theses under my direct supervision working on areas related to digital system design. I am also deeply indebted to Dr Faisal Durbai for spending time reading a few chapters and suggesting improvements. My research associates, Usman Akram and Sajid, also extended their help ingiving a careful reading of the text.

I should like to acknowledge a number of young and enthusiastic engineers who opted to work for us in Avaz and CARE, contributing to the development of several first-time-right ASICs and FPGA-based complex systems. Their hard work and dedication helped to enlighten my approach to the subject. A few names I should like to mention are Imran Qasir (IQ), Rahan Hameed, Nuaman, Mobeen, Hassan, Aeman Bukhari, Mahreen, Sadia, Hamza, Fahad Ali Mujahaid, Usman, Asim Munawar, Aysha Khalid, Alina Mufti, Hammood, Wajahat, Arsalan, Durdana, Shahbaz, Masood, Adnan, Khalid, Rabia Anwar and Javaria.

Thanks go to my collegues for keeping me motivated to complete the manuscript: Dr Habibullah Jamal, Dr Shamim Baig, Dr Abdul Khaliq, Hammad Khan, Dr Saad Rahman, Dr Muhammad Younis Javed, Asrar Ashraf, Dr Akhtar Nawaz Malik, Gen Muhammad Shahid, Dr Farrukh Kamran, Dr Saeed Ur Rahman, Dr Ismail Shah and Dr Sohail Naqvi.

Last but not least, my parents, brother, sisters and my wife Nuzhat who has given me support all through the years with love and compassion. My sons Hamza, Zaid and Talha grew from toddlers to teenagers seeing me taking on and then working on this book. My daughter Amina has consistently asked when I would finish the book!