ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to develop a basic understanding of control systems from an intuitive point of view. It provides an informal introduction to control systems design by discussing a few day-to-day life examples involving control design, open and closed feedback control systems, single-input single-output, and multiple-input multiple-output control systems. It is aimed at a reader who considers themselves a layman in control theory and wants to gain intuitive insights before diving deep and involving mathematical details. Continuous-time control systems have all the signals in a time continuum where any two points in time contain an infinite number of in-between points. In contrast, discrete-time control systems have all the signals in separate and distinct points in time, moving from one time period to the next. The control system design is a class of engineering design problem. Just like any other design problem, it requires both system analysis and creativity.
