ECE 455Embedded Software
- Units
- 0.50
- Faculty
- Engineering
When it runs
- F24
- W25
- S25
- F25
- W26
- S26
- F26
- W27
- S27
Ran in 2 of the last 7 terms. Winter 2027: not on the schedule. Spring 2027: schedule not out yet.
Concepts, theory, tools, and practice to understand, design, and write embedded software. This course covers computing elements, structures in embedded software, resource access protocols, uniprocessor scheduling, programming-language support, languages for MDD (model-driven development), worst-case execution time analysis, and overview of embedded distributed systems.
Prerequisites
- Complete all of the following
- Must have completed at least 1 of the following:
- Students must be in level 4A or higher
- Complete 1 of the following
- Enrolled in H-Software Engineering
- Enrolled in a BASc program
Antirequisites
None listed.
Leads to
No course lists it as a requisite.
Reviewed on UW Flow
76% liked it80% easy60% useful
From 29 ratings and 11 comments on UW Flow. The most helpful comments, quoted as written, without names. Read them all on UW Flow.
Took this in Spring 2024. 3 in-class quizzes, 5 assignments and a take-home programming assignment in Python for the final. The course did NOT cover the content outlined in the course description but instead placed emphasis on scheduling, worst-case execution time analysis and understanding the real-life implications of designing embedded systems. No practical embedded coding done during the course at all - only some programming exercises in Python. Overall not a bad course, but as an embedded software developer I just didn't learn what I was hoping to.
Dec 2024 · liked it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
Taken in S22 term with Professor Dunne. Relatively bird course. Content was pretty heavy on material covered in previous courses. New material included worst case execution analysis, pretty simple. Overall easy and somewhat useful course. Did not learn a lot of new material compared to previous courses.
Labs were a bit of a disaster. Three labs completely unrelated. Just felt like random individual projects with no clear learning objectives. A bug in the starter code led to misery in one of the projects (found the lab instructors stack overflow post where he misinterpreted the answer).
Lectures were well presented and clear. Slides were well organized and simple. Just wish the content…Nov 2022 · liked it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
Interesting course. You will learn "just enough to be dangerous". What topics are covered varies quite a bit depending on the professor in charge of lectures.
Aug 2014 · liked it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
As someone who works in embedded field, this course is full of bs.
Aug 2014 · didn’t like it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
It was the first offering of the course with new infrastructure for doing assignments online. It seemed to be a lot easier than it usually would have been.
Aug 2013 · liked it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
Discussed on r/uwaterloo
29 posts and comments in 23 threads mention ECE 455, November 2016 to December 2024. Quoted word for word, newest first; each reply sits under the post and the comment that started its branch. Search r/uwaterloo for newer posts.
Spring 2024
Technical Elective offered this term to take while being away from waterloo 6 points, 1 comment
u/uni_ca_007: “… From the outline, I found out that ECE 455 final is a take home, but I'm not sure about the content. I could ask him but I'm afraid he'd get offended if he knew I'm not planning to show up lol. …”
Spring 2023
What are your core courses? 8 points, 11 comments
“Basically title - What are several courses that you think really define your program? Any thoughts on them, and how they went? Looking forward to the discussion (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ\:･ﾟ✧”
u/Xierumeng: “Computer engineering: ECE 224 ECE 320 ECE 327 ECE 350 ECE 423 ECE 455 Honourable mention: ECE 105 ECE 106 Douglas Harder Peter Levine Paul Ward The ECE advisors”
Winter 2023
Opinions on these 4A CE Courses: 3 points, 0 comments
u/namomontbleau: “Currently these are the 4A CEs i’m considering: ECE455 Embedded Software ECE452 Software Design and Architecture ECE454 Distributed Computing ECE457A Co-operative and Adaptive Algorithms ECE486 Robot Dynamics and Control I’m most interested in workload, difficulty etc. …”
CE 4A TEs 8 points, 30 comments
u/OkCelery1514: “… My options: ECE 414, Wireless Communications ECE 445, Integrated Digital Electronics ECE 452, Software Design & Architecture ECE 454, Distributed Computing ECE 455, Embedded Software ECE 457A, Co-op & Adaptive Algorithms ECE 457C, Reinforcement Learning ECE 458, Computer …”
u/anonymousgoosetown: “My experiences: ECE 455: Don't recommend. Content is almost entirely review for a CE student who's taken 222, 252, 350, 327 etc. Labs were an absolute mess and did not build on each other, felt like 3 random assignments. …”
Spring 2022
A GUIDE ON HOW TO PLAN AN OPTION 29 points, 15 comments
u/1000Ditto: “Hey all, here's an example (by yours truly) of how to plan an option. as someone who has been trying to get many options in but having a hard time, might as well write down my process so others can kind of benefit from it. …”
Easiest course offered by UW? 13 points, 20 comments
u/tipimon: “ECE 455 was unironically hella easy”
Winter 2022
Switching TEs? 5 points, 2 comments
u/Odd_Jeweler1441: “… Specifically ECE 452, 455, and 458 if that matters. In a similar vein has anybody taken ECE 357C? How was it? I'm also like 3% off the required CAV to enroll in CS courses as an Engineering student. The course I want to enroll in has plenty of room so I think they'll have space. …”
Are there any courses at Waterloo in which you get work hand on with embedded systems? 10 points, 7 comments
u/barmytick: “ECE 455”
ECE455 or ECE452? 1 point, 2 comments
u/FeelingCheesecake398: “I want to explore the embedded system field a bit more but according to uwflow 455 is mostly stats. My other option is 452 which sounds more like general software course. Can anyone tell me about their experience with 455? Do you actually learn about embedded systems?”
u/ls101textbook: “I took ECE 455 with Sebastian Fischmeister in W21. I found it to be some of the easiest course credits I ever obtained. There were no hands on labs and your grades came from assignments, a couple quizzes and a final. What were the assignments, you may ask? …”
ECE transfer to Math advise 0 points, 2 comments
“I just finished my 2b term in ECE(CE) and I also applied to BMath, as I feel ECE courses are not very useful or interesting. …”
u/amxnday: “… i’m currently arranging my upcoming terms so that i’m only taking software related courses in 3B 4A 4B which is doable because there are a lot of software TEs like ECE 351, 356, 358, 452, 455, 457, 406, 451 etc.”
Fall 2021
ECE 455 useful? 1 point, 0 comments
Spring 2020
Is ECE 455 Bullshit this term 7 points, 2 comments
u/Boring_Sci_Fi: “ECE 455 seems to be absolute rubbish this term. The assignments are just "write some MC questions for me and put them in CSV format". I am half considering just dropping the course. EDIT: dropped it for HIST 216”
Check it elsewhere for Fall 2026
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