# 496: Beauty, Elegance, Consistency

- Show: [Embedded.fm](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm)
- Published: 2025-03-06
- Length: 59m
- Episode: 496
- Page: https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency
- Listen: https://embedded.fm/episodes/496

## Summary

Professor Shimon Schocken of Reichman University discusses his book 'Elements of Computing Systems' and the 'NAND to Tetris' course, which teaches computer science by building a modern computer from NAND gates up to a working Tetris game. He explains the pedagogical strategy of separating abstraction from implementation, providing students with APIs and test scripts to focus on design principles rather than error handling or efficiency. Schocken also mentions his co-author Noam Nisan, their work on teaching math via games at Matific, and future projects like building symbolic logic and molecular biology concepts from first principles.

## Chapters

- [0:06](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=6) Introduction: Shimon Schocken and the NAND to Tetris Course
- [8:24](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=504) Pedagogical Concessions: Abstraction, APIs, and Testing
- [14:13](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=853) Teaching Design Through Examples and Reading Code
- [24:27](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=1467) Course Prerequisites and the FPGA Extension Project
- [39:14](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=2354) Future Projects: Symbolic Logic and From NAND to Life
- [45:24](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/embedded-fm/2025-03-06-496-beauty-elegance-consistency#t=2724) Bottom-Up vs Top-Down Education and Final Advice

## Topics

- [Careers & education](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/engineering-careers-and-education)
- [Embedded firmware](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/embedded-firmware)
- [AI & machine learning](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/ai-and-machine-learning)

## Most relevant to

established companies

## Mentioned

- Reichman University (company)
- Elements of Computing Systems (product)
- NAND to Tetris (product)
- CS Unplugged (product)
- Tim Bell (other)
- Noam Nisan (other)
- Matific (company)
- Memfault (company)
- Bose (company)
- Lyft (company)
- Logitech (company)
- Panasonic (company)
- Augury (company)
- Adafruit (company)
- Coursera (company)
- Michael Schröder (other)
- Yannai Gonczarowski (other)
- Cambridge University Press (company)
- Verilog (tool)
- VHDL (tool)

## Related episodes from other shows

- [AI in Computer Science Education](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2026-05-10-ai-in-computer-science-education) (Oxide and Friends)
- [An Interview with Ben Eater](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/the-amp-hour/2019-05-27-an-interview-with-ben-eater) (The Amp Hour)
- [The Secret Life of Circuits with lcamtuf / Michał Zalewski](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/the-amp-hour/2026-06-04-the-secret-life-of-circuits-with-lcamtuf-micha-zalewski) (The Amp Hour)
- [Open Circuits with Eric Schlaepfer and Windell Oskay](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/the-amp-hour/2022-11-14-open-circuits-with-eric-schlaepfer-and-windell-oskay) (The Amp Hour)
- [539: My Ai Powered Ergonomic Chair](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/making-it/2026-09-25-539-my-ai-powered-ergonomic-chair) (Making It)

## Citing this page

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