The manual was written on the basis of lectures given by the author over the years at the Physics Department of Perm University in the disciplines "Theory of Automatic Control" and "Design of Digital Control Systems." It systematically sets out the foundations of the modern theory of control of physical systems and technical devices. The basics of mathematical modeling of control systems, the properties of closed-loop control systems and the main methods for analyzing the stability of continuous and discrete systems are considered, the methods of the traditional theory of optimal control, as well as modern adaptive and robust control algorithms are described. The MATLAB package was used as a software product accompanying the lectures. Recommended for students of the Physics Department of Physics and Radiophysics and Electronics.