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INTRODUCTION TO CONTROL SYSTEMS IN SCILAB

In this Scilab tutorial, we introduce readers to the Control System Toolbox that is
available in Scilab/Xcos and known as CACSD. This first tutorial is dedicated to
"Linear Time Invariant" (LTI) systems and their representations in Scilab.

Level

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

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Step 1: LTI systems
Linear Time Invariant (LTI) systems are a particular class of systems
characterized by the following features:

Linearity: which means that there is a linear relation between the

input and the output of the system. For example, if we scale and
sum all the input (linear combination) then the output are scaled
and summed in the same manner. More formally, denoting with
a generic input and with a generic output we have:

Time invariance: which mean that the system is invariant for

time translations. Hence, the output produced by the input
is identical to the output produced by the input
which is shifted by the quantity .

Thanks to these properties, in the time domain, we have that any LTI
system can be characterized entirely by a single function which is the
response to the system’s impulse. The system’s output is the
convolution of the input with the system's impulse response.

In the frequency domain, the system is characterized by the transfer

function which is the Laplace transform of the system’s impulse
response.

The same results are true for discrete time linear shift-invariant
systems which signals are discrete-time samples.

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 2/17

Step 2: LTI representations
LTI systems can be classified into the following two major groups:

SISO: Single Input Single Output;

MIMO: Multiple Input Multiple Output.

LTI systems have several representation forms:

Set of differential equations in the state space representation;

Transfer function representation; A typical representation of a system with its input and output ports and
its internal state
Zero-pole representation.

Step 3: RLC example

This RLC example is used to compare all the LTI representations. The
example refers to a RLC low passive filter, where the input is
represented by the voltage drop "V_in" while the output "V_out" is
voltage across the resistor.

In our examples we choose:

Input signal: ;
Resistor: ;

Inductor: ; (Example scheme)

Capacitor: .

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 // Problem data
Step 4: Analytical solution of the RLC example A = 1.0; f = 1e+4;
R = 10; // Resistor [Ohm]
The relation between the input and the output of the system is: L = 1e-3; // Inductor [H]
C = 1e-6; // Capacitor [F]

// Problem function
function zdot=RLCsystem(t, y)
z1 = y(1); z2 = y(2);
// Compute input
Vin = A*sin(2*%pi*f*t);
zdot(1) = z2; zdot(2) = (Vin - z1 - L*z2/R) /(L*C);
endfunction

// Simulation time [1 ms]

t = linspace(0,1e-3,1001);

// Initial conditions and solving the ode system

y0 = [0;0]; t0 = t(1);
y = ode(y0,t0,t,RLCsystem);

// Plotting results
Vin = A*sin(2*%pi*f*t)';
scf(1); clf(1); plot(t,[Vin,y(1,:)']); legend(["Vin";"Vout"]);
(Numerical solution code)
On the right we report a plot of the solution for the following values of the
constants:

[V];

[Hz];

[Ohm];

[H];

[F];

with initial conditions: .

(Simulation results)

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 4/17

Step 5: Xcos diagram of the RLC circuit
There can be many Xcos block formulation for the RLC circuit but the one
which allows fast and accurate results is the one that uses only
integration blocks instead of derivate blocks.

The idea is to start assembling the differential part of the diagram as:

and
and then to complete the scheme taking into consideration the relations
(Kirchhoff’s laws) and with . (Simulation diagram)

At the end, we add the model for as follows:

The simulation results are stored in the Scilab mlist variable "results"
and plotted using the command

(Simulation results)
// Plotting data
plot(results.time,results.values)

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Step 6: Another Xcos diagram of the RLC circuit
On the right we report another Xcos representation of the system which is
obtained starting from the system differential equation:

As previously done, the scheme is obtained starting from

and using the relation

(Simulation diagram)
which relates the second derivative of the to the other variables.

(Simulation results)

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Step 7: State space representation
The state space representation of any LTI system can be stated as
follows:

where is the state vector (a collection of all internal variables that are
used to describe the dynamic of the system) of dimension , is the
output vector of dimension associated to observation and is the input
vector of dimension .

Here, the first equation represents the state updating equations while the State space representation
second one relates the system output to the state variables.

In many engineering problem the matrix is the null matrix, and hence
the output equation reduces to , which is a weight combination of
the state variables.

A space-state representation in term of block is reported on the right.

Note that the representation requires the choice of the state variable. This
choice is not trivial since there are many possibilities. The number of state
variables is generally equal to the order of the system’s differential
equations. In electrical circuit, a typical choice consists of picking all
variables associated to differential elements (capacitor and inductor).

Block diagram representation of the state space equations

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Step 8: State space representation of the RLC circuit
In order to write the space state representation of the RLC circuit we
perform the following steps:

Choose the modeling variable: Here we use ,

and ;

Write the state update equation in the form ;

For the current in the inductor we have:
(Simulation diagram)
For the voltage across the capacitor we have:

Write the observer equation in the form .

(Input mask)
The output voltage is equal to the voltage of the capacitor
. Hence the equation can be written as

The diagram representation is reported on the right using the Xcos block:

which can directly manage the matrices "A", "B", "C" and "D".

(Simulation results)

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 8/17

Step 9: Transfer function representation
In a LTI SISO system, a transfer function is a mathematical relation
between the input and the output in the Laplace domain considering its
initial conditions and equilibrium point to be zero.

For example, starting from the differential equation of the RLC example,

the transfer function is obtained as follows:

that is:

Examples of Laplace transformations:

Time domain Laplace domain

In the case of MIMO systems we don’t have a single polynomial transfer
function but a matrix of transfer functions where each entry is the transfer
function relationship between each individual input and each individual
output.

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 9/17

Step 10: Transfer function representation of the RLC
circuit
The diagram representation is reported on the right. Here we use the
Xcos block:

which the user can specify the numerator and denominator of the transfer (Simulation diagram)
functions in term of the variable "s".

The transfer function is

and, hence, we have:

(Input mask)

(Simulation results)

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 10/17

Step 11: Zero-pole representation and example
Another possible representation is obtained by the use of the partial
fraction decomposition reducing the transfer function

into a function of the form:

(Simulation diagram)
where is the gain constant and and are, respectively, the zeros of
the numerator and poles of the denominator of the transfer function.

This representation has the advantage to explicit the zeros and poles of
the transfer function and so the performance of the dynamic system.

If we want to specify the transfer function in term of this representation in

Xcos, we can do that using the block

(Input mask)

and specifying the numerator and denominator.

In our case, we have

with

(Simulation results)

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 11/17

Step 12: Converting between representations
// Create a polynomial by its roots
In the following steps we will see how to change representation in Scilab p = poly([1 -2],'s')

in an easy way. Before that, it is necessary to review some notes about // Create a polynomial by its coefficient
polynomial representation in Scilab. p = poly([-2 1 1],'s','c')

// Create a polynomial by its coefficient

// Octave/MATLAB(R) style
pcoeff = [1 1 -2];
A polynomial of degree is a function of the form: p = poly(pcoeff($:-1:1),'s','c')
pcoeffs = coeff(p)

// Create a polynomial using the %s variable

Note that in Scilab the order of polynomial coefficient is reversed from that s = %s;
® ® p = - 2 + s + s^2
of MATLAB or Octave .
// Another way to create the polynomial
p = (s-1)*(s+2)

The main Scilab commands for managing polynomials are: // Evaluate a polynomial
res = horner(p,1.0)
%s: A Scilab variable used to define polynomials;
// Some operation on polynomial, sum, product and find zeros
q = p+2
poly: to create a polynomial starting from its roots or its r = p*q
coefficients; rzer = roots(r)

coeff: to extract the coefficient of the polynomial; // Symbolic substitution and check
pp = horner(q,p)
res = pp -p-p^2
horner: to evaluate a polynomial; typeof(res)

derivat: to compute the derivate of a polynomial; // Standard polynomial division

[Q,R] = pdiv(p,q)
roots: to compute the zeros of the polynomial;
// Rational polynomial
+, -, *: standard polynomial operations; prat = p/q
typeof(prat)
pdiv: polynomial division; prat.num
prat.den
/: generate a rational polynomial i.e. the division between two // matrix polynomial and its inversion
polynomials; r = [1 , 1/s; 0 1]
rinv = inv(r)
inv or invr: inversion of (rational) matrix.

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Step 13: Converting between representations // RLC low passive filter data
mR = 10; // Resistor [Ohm]
The state-space representation of our example is: mL = 1e-3; // Inductor [H]
mC = 1e-6; // Capacitor [F]
mRC = mR*mC;
mf = 1e+4;

// Define system matrix

A = [0 -1/mL; 1/mC -1/mRC];
B = [1/mL; 0];
C = [0 1];
D = [0];
while the transfer function is
// State space
sl = syslin('c',A,B,C,D)
h = ss2tf(sl)
sl1 = tf2ss(h)

// Transformation
T = [1 0; 1 1];
sl2 = ss2ss(sl,T)
In Scilab it is possible to move from the state-space representation to the
// Canonical form
transfer function using the command ss2tf. The vice versa is possible [Ac,Bc,U,ind]=canon(A,B)
using the command tf2ss.
// zero-poles
In the reported code (right), we use the "tf2ss" function to go back to the [hm]=trfmod(h)

previous state but we do not find the original state-space representation.

This is due to the fact that the state-space representation is not unique
and depends on the adopted change of variables.

The Scilab command ss2ss transforms the system through the use of a
change matrix , while the command canon generates a transformation
of the system such that the matrix "A" is on the Jordan form.

The zeros and the poles of the transfer function can be display using the
(Output of the command trfmod)
command trfmod.

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 // the step response (continuous system)
Step 14: Time response t = linspace(0,1e-3,101);
y = csim('step',t,sl);
For a LTI system the output can be computed using the formula: scf(1); clf(1);
plot(t,y);

// the step response (discrete system)

t = linspace(0,1e-3,101);
u = ones(1,length(t));
dt = t(2)-t(1);
y = dsimul(dscr(h,dt),u);
In Scilab this can be done using the command csim for continuous scf(2); clf(2);
plot(t,y);
system while the command dsimul can be used for discrete systems.
// the user define response
The conversion between continuous and discrete system is done using t = linspace(0,1e-3,1001);
u = sin(2*%pi*mf*t);
the command dscr specifying the discretization time step. y = csim(u,t,sl);
scf(3); clf(3);
plot(t,[y',u']);

On the right we report some examples: the transfer function is relative to

the RLC example.

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 14/17

 // bode
Step 15: Frequency domain response scf(4); clf(4);
bode(h,1e+1,1e+6);
The Frequency Response is the relation between input and output in the
// Nyquist
complex domain. This is obtained from the transfer function, by scf(5); clf(5);
replacing with . nyquist(sl,1e+1,1e+6);

The two main charts are:

Bode diagram: In Scilab this can be done using the command

bode;

And Nyquist diagram: In Scilab this can be done using the

command nyquist.

(Bode diagram)

(Nyquist diagram)

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 15/17

Step 16: Exercise
Study in term of time and frequency responses of the following RC band-
pass filter:

(step response)

(Bode diagram)
Use the following values for the simulations:

[Ohm];

[F];

[Ohm];

[F].

Hints: The transfer function is:

(Nyquist diagram)

The transfer function can be defined using the command syslin.

Control Systems in Scilab www.openeering.com page 16/17

Step 17: Concluding remarks and References
In this tutorial we have presented some modeling approaches in 1. Scilab Web Page: Available: www.scilab.org.
Scilab/Xcos using the Control System Toolbox available in Scilab known
2. Openeering: www.openeering.com.
as CACSD.

Step 18: Software content

To report bugs or suggest improvements please contact the Openeering
team.

www.openeering.com. --------------
Main directory
--------------
ex1.sce : Exercise 1
Thanks for the bug report: Konrad Kmieciak. numsol.sce : Numerical solution of RLC example
poly_example.sce : Polynomial in Scilab
RLC_Xcos.xcos : RLC in standard Xcos
RLC_Xcos_ABCD.xcos : RLC in ABCD formulation
RLC_Xcos_eq.xcos : Another formulation of RLC in Xcos
RLC_Xcos_tf.xcos : RLC in transfer function form.
RLC_Xcos_zp.xcos : RLC in zeros-poles form.
system_analysis.sce : RLC example system analysis
license.txt : The license file

Thank you for your attention,

Manolo Venturin

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