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Stupid comments by an engineer...

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Jim Thompson...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 10:08 am

Guest

On Fri, 30 Oct 2009 08:54:57 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
<zapwireDASHgroups at (no spam) yahoo.com> wrote:

[quote]Hi Jim,

"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message news:b40ke5ljn7ts1bkuj42gf26q4t0biu45sp at (no spam) 4ax.com...
Yep, MIT is well known as a party school. When I was a student, the
local liquor stores would deliver to the dorms, no ID checked.

Nice!
[/quote]
In Massachusetts, epitome of the church-police state, no less ;-)

Reminds me... back then, 1958+, it was illegal to sell prophylactics.
However a discrete inquiry at a drug store got me an offer for a good
price on a gross ;-)

[quote]
Is there interest? Analog I/C design is almost a lost art.

Here's one dude who's teaching it:
http://www.aicdesign.org/upcomingcourse.html -- $1800 for a week with him. (I
can't say I know who he is -- although I probably should Smile

--... seems like
he has a book out too:
http://www.amazon.com/Analog-Circuit-Design-Phillip-Allen/dp/0195116445 ).

Several people at work here have taken Besser classes:
http://www.besserassociates.com/ -- quality is fine, although their prices
tend to be on the high end.

---Joel

[/quote]
So it looks like the basics are already covered.

I've contemplated, more for amusement than anything else, selling "A
Week with the Master", look over my shoulder while I do a real design,
but I'm sure there'd be no takers ;-)

It would take a student already with some I/C design experience to
keep up. But, from what I note of the lurkers, the handful who know
I/C design are already experts themselves.

(And the rest are mouthy know-nothings Wink

Joel Koltner...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 10:09 am

Guest

"Les Cargill" <lcargill99 at (no spam) comcast.net> wrote in message
news:hcdmr0$ia4$1 at (no spam) news.eternal-september.org...
[quote]I had the great fortune of relatives bringing me broken kit
to fix, under supervision. So can you do that with an iPod?
[/quote]
Perhaps not as "well" -- clearly the average kid isn't going to have anything
approaching the means to, e.g., swap a BGA component -- but there's still some
opportunity for learning in replacing broken headphone jacks, cracked LCD
modules, dead hard drives from being dropped, etc.

[quote]I had these great Radio Shack kits, where one would trap
discrete components under springs to make circuits. These were
designed to make electronics feel like anything but deferred
gratification.
[/quote]
Similar items are still around, e.g., http://www.elenco.com/snapcircuits.html
(even Radio Shack has a few kits like that). And microcontroller development
kits (from, e.g., Parallax) are very common today if you're interested in
digital electronics. In fact, personally I believe that electronics is far
more accessible, cheaper, and easier than ever today... it's just that the
interest in it -- particularly analog design -- has largely waned due to the
"wow" factor of iPhones, Wiis, and PCs.

---Joel

Joel Koltner...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 11:36 am

Guest

"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message news:dd3me5hkur1j5hri4llr94q55a28mkceub at (no spam) 4ax.com...
[quote]local liquor stores would deliver to the dorms, no ID checked.
Reminds me... back then, 1958+, it was illegal to sell prophylactics.
[/quote]
Sounds like a policy aimed at rapidly increasing the population. :-)

I didn't realize that prophylactics had ever been illegal. Sheesh...

[quote]I've contemplated, more for amusement than anything else, selling "A
Week with the Master", look over my shoulder while I do a real design,
but I'm sure there'd be no takers Wink

[/quote]
I would guess there's a bit of a time problem there in that in an 8 hour day
there's perhaps an hour of "really good tricks" and 7 hours of, "now I hit
'simulate' on PSpice, and now I'm going to go grab a glass of wine and check
our what the horned owls have eaten for dinner while it simulates for the next
10 minutes..." ?

Something like a "Highlight of A Week With the Master" on DVD might sell quite
well... Randy Rhea sort of headed that direction with some of his DVDs (e.g.,
http://www.scitechpublishing.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=338) in
that he'd often be working through a sample design while simultaneously try to
present "the basics" -- but in your case I like the idea of working through
real designs and going with the assumption that the viewer knows how to bias a
transistor for a given transconductance, how a basic current mirror works,
etc.

And think of the "satisfaction" you'd get if you noticed one of your DVDs
being ordered from Nijmegen... :-)

---Joel

Jim Thompson...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 11:59 am

Guest

On Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:36:03 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
<zapwireDASHgroups at (no spam) yahoo.com> wrote:

[quote]"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message news:dd3me5hkur1j5hri4llr94q55a28mkceub at (no spam) 4ax.com...
local liquor stores would deliver to the dorms, no ID checked.
Reminds me... back then, 1958+, it was illegal to sell prophylactics.

Sounds like a policy aimed at rapidly increasing the population. :-)

I didn't realize that prophylactics had ever been illegal. Sheesh...
[/quote]
At that time the Catholic Church had Massa2shits (and the Boston
Police Department) in a throttle hold.

So badly that the TV showing of "Biography of a Bookie Joint"

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2007/05/25/publiceye/entry2851759.shtml

was blocked on all Massachusetts' TV stations.

(I rigged an antenna pointing toward Providence to see it anyhow...
from our apartment, actually the third floor of an old house on
Magazine Street near Memorial Drive ;-)

I was also arrested and cited for working on Sunday... in Cambridge,
wiring my landlord's garage (formally a carriage house) for lighting,
in exchange for a month's rent.

[quote]
I've contemplated, more for amusement than anything else, selling "A
Week with the Master", look over my shoulder while I do a real design,
but I'm sure there'd be no takers ;-)

I would guess there's a bit of a time problem there in that in an 8 hour day
there's perhaps an hour of "really good tricks" and 7 hours of, "now I hit
'simulate' on PSpice, and now I'm going to go grab a glass of wine and check
our what the horned owls have eaten for dinner while it simulates for the next
10 minutes..." ?
[/quote]
Possibly, but not likely... I usually don't imbibe until around 6-7 in
the evening... when I turn on O'Reilly ;-)

While simulations run I doodle ideas on paper... I go thru LOTS of
quadrille pads ;-)

[quote]
Something like a "Highlight of A Week With the Master" on DVD might sell quite
well... Randy Rhea sort of headed that direction with some of his DVDs (e.g.,
http://www.scitechpublishing.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=338) in
that he'd often be working through a sample design while simultaneously try to
present "the basics" -- but in your case I like the idea of working through
real designs and going with the assumption that the viewer knows how to bias a
transistor for a given transconductance, how a basic current mirror works,
etc.

And think of the "satisfaction" you'd get if you noticed one of your DVDs
being ordered from Nijmegen... :-)

---Joel

[/quote]
Sno-o-o-o-ort ;-)

Hmmmm? I suppose I could release a CD/DVD of schematics, with
explanations... Win's stuff seems to sell well. I have done literally
100's of chip designs, and the latest one was 70+ pages of drawings
Wink

Joel Koltner...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 12:35 pm

Guest

"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message
[quote]I was also arrested and cited for working on Sunday... in Cambridge,
wiring my landlord's garage (formally a carriage house) for lighting,
in exchange for a month's rent.
[/quote]
Amazing. Truly amazing...

I think it popped up here a couple months ago, but in case you didn't see it,
this little take on HP's garage is good:
http://www.hpmuseum.org/garage/garage.htm

[quote]Possibly, but not likely... I usually don't imbibe until around 6-7 in
the evening... when I turn on O'Reilly Wink

[/quote]
O'Reilly is a pretty reasonable/sane guy; not bad at all to listen to, and I
think there's more "substance" than some of the more popular guys (on both
sides... e.g., Rush Limbaugh or Al Frankin... And whereas O'Reilly was
willing to go on Stephen Colbert's show, I can't imagine Rush would visit,
say, John Stewart...)

[quote]Hmmmm? I suppose I could release a CD/DVD of schematics, with
explanations...
[/quote]
Absolutely, I'd certainly buy a copy.

---Joel

Tim Williams...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 3:37 pm

Guest

On Oct 29, 1:25 pm, Joerg <inva... at (no spam) invalid.invalid> wrote:
[quote]One of the huge mistakes in academia. Right up there with universities
and colleges not allowing practicing engineers to teach because they
don't have the "proper credentials".
[/quote]
Ah, there are a number of professionals here, actually, at Milwaukee
School of Engineering. Freshmen are recommended to address their
instructors "Professor" when in doubt, as they aren't necessarily
Doctors.

Still, you have to weigh the fact that those are the people willing to
teach instead of only work, so maybe it's not as good as it
sounds. ;-)

Tim

Tim Williams...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 3:56 pm

Guest

On Oct 29, 6:47 pm, Ian Bell <ruffreco... at (no spam) yahoo.com> wrote:
[quote]Is it me or was it only 'in the old days' that people went into
electronics (.i.e. got educated in it at college level) because they
were already hooked on it and had built a bunch of stuff? A friend and I
were selling crystal radios at primary school before we were eleven
years old. By the time I was 18 and went to university I had read every
electronics book in the city library, passed the Radio Amateurs Exam,
and built dozens of bits of kit. Don't kids do that any more?
[/quote]
Nope, they really don't.

I got to chat with the school's EE chair once. He said, about 30
years ago, people like me (kids who stuck screwdrivers into radios)
were common (he was one himself), so there was a lot of curriculum
they could test out of, or heck maybe even in those days it was just
"you know ohm's law? sure, you can skip this prerequisite".

But nowadays, that's a lot less common (probably less than 10%), and
the certifications are more stringent, and the bureaucracy more
impersonal, so I'm doomed to sit in classes alongside students who
don't know the right end of the soldering iron.

Not that the classes are very useful anyway. I'm in a control systems
class right now. I still don't know what the hell 1/(s+2) is. I know
full well what 1 / (s + 1/RC) is, but see, that's not what they
teach. It's just more numbers, run the algebra and find the answer.
Who cares which way it goes with respect to something like frequency.
Academia is all about abstraction, because it's an escape from
reality, and algorism (Laplace transforms, etc.) because it's easy.
No one teaches practical stuff, and no one teaches the holistic point
of view.

Tim

Jim Thompson...

Posted: Fri Oct 30, 2009 6:21 pm

Guest

On Fri, 30 Oct 2009 11:35:10 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
<zapwireDASHgroups at (no spam) yahoo.com> wrote:

[quote]"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message
I was also arrested and cited for working on Sunday... in Cambridge,
wiring my landlord's garage (formally a carriage house) for lighting,
in exchange for a month's rent.

Amazing. Truly amazing...

I think it popped up here a couple months ago, but in case you didn't see it,
this little take on HP's garage is good:
http://www.hpmuseum.org/garage/garage.htm

Possibly, but not likely... I usually don't imbibe until around 6-7 in
the evening... when I turn on O'Reilly ;-)

O'Reilly is a pretty reasonable/sane guy; not bad at all to listen to, and I
think there's more "substance" than some of the more popular guys (on both
sides... e.g., Rush Limbaugh or Al Frankin... And whereas O'Reilly was
willing to go on Stephen Colbert's show, I can't imagine Rush would visit,
say, John Stewart...)
[/quote]
O'Reilly appeared on "The View" today... hilarious, costumed as Count
Dracula ;-)

[quote]
Hmmmm? I suppose I could release a CD/DVD of schematics, with
explanations...

Absolutely, I'd certainly buy a copy.

---Joel

[/quote]
How much $ Smile

krw...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 11:38 am

Guest

On Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:56:00 -0700 (PDT), Tim Williams
<tmoranwms at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:

[quote]On Oct 29, 6:47 pm, Ian Bell <ruffreco... at (no spam) yahoo.com> wrote:
Is it me or was it only 'in the old days' that people went into
electronics (.i.e. got educated in it at college level) because they
were already hooked on it and had built a bunch of stuff? A friend and I
were selling crystal radios at primary school before we were eleven
years old. By the time I was 18 and went to university I had read every
electronics book in the city library, passed the Radio Amateurs Exam,
and built dozens of bits of kit. Don't kids do that any more?

Nope, they really don't.

I got to chat with the school's EE chair once. He said, about 30
years ago, people like me (kids who stuck screwdrivers into radios)
were common (he was one himself), so there was a lot of curriculum
they could test out of, or heck maybe even in those days it was just
"you know ohm's law? sure, you can skip this prerequisite".
[/quote]
No money in the degree if they allow you to test out of courses.

[quote]But nowadays, that's a lot less common (probably less than 10%), and
the certifications are more stringent, and the bureaucracy more
impersonal, so I'm doomed to sit in classes alongside students who
don't know the right end of the soldering iron.
[/quote]
In fairness, most will never need to touch a soldering iron. I've
worked with many who haven't into any sort of lab since college. There
is a lot more to EE, these days, than PCBs.

[quote]Not that the classes are very useful anyway. I'm in a control systems
class right now. I still don't know what the hell 1/(s+2) is. I know
full well what 1 / (s + 1/RC) is, but see, that's not what they
teach. It's just more numbers, run the algebra and find the answer.
[/quote]
That is an issue. Laplace should be taught after there is a sound
circuits understanding. They never taught Gregg before English.

[quote]Who cares which way it goes with respect to something like frequency.
Academia is all about abstraction, because it's an escape from
reality, and algorism (Laplace transforms, etc.) because it's easy.
No one teaches practical stuff, and no one teaches the holistic point
of view.
[/quote]
Nah, an "algorism" is:

"I'm always right, no matter how the facts turn out."

100WattDarkSucker...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 11:43 am

Guest

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:38:25 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

[quote]"I'm always right, no matter how the facts turn out."
[/quote]
Sounds like the KRW mind set to me.

krw...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 11:52 am

Guest

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 10:43:41 -0700, 100WattDarkSucker
<100WattDarkSucker at (no spam) thebigbarattheendoftheuniverse.org> wrote:

[quote]On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:38:25 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

"I'm always right, no matter how the facts turn out."

Sounds like the KRW mind set to me.
[/quote]
Even if true, it beats *being* AlwaysWrong, hands down.

100WattDarkSucker...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:00 pm

Guest

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:52:12 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

[quote]On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 10:43:41 -0700, 100WattDarkSucker
100WattDarkSucker at (no spam) thebigbarattheendoftheuniverse.org> wrote:

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:38:25 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

"I'm always right, no matter how the facts turn out."

Sounds like the KRW mind set to me.

Even if true, it beats *being* AlwaysWrong, hands down.
[/quote]

I guess you'll have to perform a complete reversal of your past twenty
years then.

Jim Thompson...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:06 pm

Guest

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:52:12 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

[quote]On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 10:43:41 -0700, 100WattDarkSucker
100WattDarkSucker at (no spam) thebigbarattheendoftheuniverse.org> wrote:

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:38:25 -0500, krw <krw at (no spam) att.bizzzzzzzzzzz> wrote:

"I'm always right, no matter how the facts turn out."

Sounds like the KRW mind set to me.

Even if true, it beats *being* AlwaysWrong, hands down.
[/quote]
Some day we will seek out Nymbecile, show him multiple sheets of paper
listing his ignorant statements, then drag him behind a pick-up truck.

In the meantime, krw, I must add you to my file of...

(From: troll-feeder) & ((troll-in-reference)|(troll-in-body))

pairs... sorry Wink

Archimedes' Lever...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:44 pm

Guest

On Sat, 31 Oct 2009 11:06:16 -0700, Jim Thompson
<To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote:

[quote]
Some day we will seek out Archimedes,
[/quote]

You had better watch how you word your utter horseshit, boy.

RST Engineering - JIm...

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2009 1:01 pm

Guest

"Jim Thompson" <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon at (no spam) My-Web-Site.com> wrote in
message news:8boje5hkbqm3fg6nc6p5sc81o20o5sfl6j at (no spam) 4ax.com...
[quote]
Happened to me. In the early '70's there was a shortage of
technicians. I offered to teach FOR FREE at the local community
college. I was declined because _I_only_had_a_Masters_ :-)

...Jim Thompson
[/quote]

Dunno what you did wrong, Jimbo. I've been teaching Electronics Technology
at the local community college since the early 1980s on a BS-Physics.

Jim

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