ECO 231

Signals and Systems

Types and Classifications of Signals (1)

Signal Types

Signals

Continuous-time Discrete-time

Continuous-value Discrete-value
Continuous-value

Analog Discrete Digital

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 Continuous-Time Signals

 Most signals in the real world are

continuous time, as the scale is
infinitesimally fine.
 E.g. voltage, velocity,
 Denote by x(t), where the time interval may
be bounded (finite) or infinite

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Continuous-time signals
 A value of signal exists at every instant of time

t
Independent variable

t
Independent variable

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Discrete-Time Signals

 Some real world and many digital signals are

discrete time, as they are sampled
 E.g. pixels, daily stock price (anything that a
digital computer processes)
 Denote by x[n], where n is an integer value
that varies discretely.

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Discrete-time signals
 The value of signal exists only at equally spaced
discrete points in time

n
Independent variable

n
Independent variable

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Discrete-time signals

 Why to discretize
 How to discretize
 How closely spaced are the samples
 Distinction between discrete & digital signals
 How to denote discrete signals
 Is the image a discrete or continuous signal
 The image is generally considered to be a continuous
variable
 Sampling can however be used to obtain a discrete, two
dimensional signal (sampled image)

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What is Digital Signal
Processing (DSP)?
 Consists of three words:
Digital , Signal and Processing
 Signal: any (physical or non-physical)
quantity that varies with time, space, or
other independent variable(s)
 Digital: a discrete-time and discrete-
valued signal, i.e. digitization involves
both sampling and quantization
 Processing: operations on the signal

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Continuous-time vs. Discrete-
time
 Continuous-time signals are signals defined at each value of
independent variable(s).
 They have values in a continuous interval (a,b) that could
extend from -∞ to ∞.
 Discrete-time signals are defined only at specific values of
independent variable(s).
 Discrete-time signals are represented mathematically by a
sequence of real or complex numbers.

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 Continuous-time vs. Discrete-
CT DT
time
Continuous function V of Discrete function V of k

continuous variable t (time, discrete sampling variable tk,

space etc) : V(t). with k = integer: Vk = V(tk).

0.3 0.3
0.2 0.2
Voltage [V]

Voltage [V]
0.1 0.1
0 0
-0.1 -0.1 ts
-0.2 -0.2
0 2 4 6 8 10 0 2 4 6 8 10
time [ms] sampling time, tk [ms]

Periodic sampling
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Continuous-valued vs. Discrete-
valued
 Both continuous and discrete-time signals can
take a finite (discrete) or infinite (continuous)
range.
 For a signal to be called digital, it must be
discrete-time and discrete-range, i.e.
digitization involves both sampling and
quantization.

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Notation
 A continuous-time signal is represented by enclosing the independent
variable (time) in parentheses ()

xt 

 A discrete-time signal is represented by enclosing the independent

variable (index) in square brackets []

xn

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n
Important Parameters

 Signal power
 Signal energy

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Continuous time Signal power

 Our usual notion of the energy of a signal is the area

under the curve f(t)2.

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