Request for help to improve my problem solving ability

[john_tetris]

I'm on chapter 3, and since the beginning of the course, I've had to come to the forums for hints in implementing almost every chip. It takes me about an hour of errors, troubleshooting, and contemplating before I come up with the correct implementation for each chip. I feel that I'm taking too long and am experiencing much more difficulty than the typical student of this course.

I've read through chapter 3, the appendices, watched the Coursera lectures, went through the lecture slides, and also read through the HDL survival guide.

Do you have any recommendations for other prerequisite material that might help me before I continue on?

Thank you.

[ivant]

First of all, don't give up! This isn't a competition, so you don't need to measure yourself with the perceived achievements of the others. It's not an even field either. For example, I started learning about computers back in 1985 and haven't stopped since. I knew a lot of the stuff already, so I found some parts easy. But I still learned a tremendous amount from this course.

I can also suggest the book Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software by Charles Petzold. It tackles very similar problems, but has a bit different focus. It may help you better understand some of the concepts. I think Code and Elements nicely complement each other.

[cadet1620]

You might want to check out http://play-hookey.com/digital/. This site has well presented information on digital circuits, and it has "live" circuit diagrams that you can change inputs with mouse clicks and explore how the circuits work.

Also, if you learn by exploring, check out Logisim. It is a schematic-based logic simulator that will let you easily explore different logic configurations.

[john_tetris]

I've requested the book Code at my local library and Logisim is an amazing tool. I like being able to play around visually with the chips like this. It's a lot better than pen/paper, for sure. Thank you both for your help.

[cadet1620]

If you want to see a Hack computer running in Logisim, check out this forum post.

The downloadable files include a library of Nand2Tetris parts with outlines that match the books schematics (mostly).  

There are no spoilers in this circuit. The CPU is just the proposed schematic from the book and the library parts are just wrappers around the equivalent Logisim part or really obscure implementations.