What is a plant in the context of this class?

A plant for this course will refer to the system or process we are interested in controlling or studying its dynamics. For example, if we want to drive at a reference speed using the cruise control, the motion of the car is the process (plant) we would like to control. The cruise control system implements a control law to modify the dynamics of the car and cruise at the reference speed. --Luis Soto 22:36, 13 October 2008 (PDT)