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On 07/31/2022 03:32 PM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 13:58:38 -0700 (PDT), Simon S Aysdie
gwhite@ti.com> wrote:
On Tuesday, July 26, 2022 at 10:44:08 AM UTC-7, John Larkin wrote:
https://www.studyfinds.org/fear-for-safety-every-day/
What\'s wrong with kids these days? Most have been super-protected
children but are afraid of life.
Engineers have to THINK, blow things up, take calculated risks. Fear
warps prudent judgement.
I\'ve had interns that were afraid to touch a board powered from 5
volts, or handle a 12 volt battery. And wanted eye protection and
masks for everything. And who wouldn\'t crank up a power supply to see
how much an electrolytic cap would leak past abs max voltage rating.
People are terrified of abs max. That\'s an interesting topic, abs max.
Especially for RF parts.
Half of young things are afraid to ride Lyft!
I wonder if all this social media and constant texting creates fear
circles, tribes of wusses, just as it aggregates political tendencies.
PUT YOUR MASK ON, JOHN!!!!!
I only masked for a couple of very good restaurants, which was silly
because as soon as they served water everyone took their masks off.
Some people are still masking, even outdoors. I guess they will for
the rest of their lives.
I went to an Irish festival in the park yesterday and there were only a
few maskers. Some of them lost the masks as the day went on. The 100
degree weather might have been a factor. I can\'t imagine...
On Mon, 1 Aug 2022 09:02:36 +1000, Clifford Heath <no_spam@please.net
wrote:
On 31/7/22 15:37, rbowman wrote:
On 07/30/2022 04:09 PM, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund wrote:
Engineers on the brink of extinction threaten entire tech ecosystems:
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/18/electrical_engineers_extinction/
I think the article has a valid point. I\'ve got hopes for the maker
culture but I don\'t know how many participate. Our new library has a
nicely equipped makerspace with several printers, scanners, laser
cutters and so forth.
The maker movement is mostly made of regret. Teen years wasted playing
video games, didn\'t learn any construction skills, but find themselves
dependent on stuff that other folk have made. Get the urge to know how
to make stuff, but have no-one (but other ignorami) to teach them anything.
Don\'t know how to use a saw or a chisel, but they try to build and use
CNC mills and laser cutters. No idea how to choose the right glue or use
a welder, so they make things in CAD and use a 3D printer. Have never
fixed their bicycle, but they want to build android robots. Don\'t
understand aerodynamics enough to build a good paper dart, but they want
to customize drones.
Sad really.
A manual mill is better to learn on. You can feel the forces.
Ratshack used to have a lot of components, but I guess the world
passed them by.
We called them RusskyShack because they all seemed to be run by
Russians. Sort of like Cambodians and donuts or Indians and motels.
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking
being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they
start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum --
prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the
bulk stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 17:43:10 -0700, Don Y
blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum -- prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the bulk
stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I did when I was 10. Electrical engineer.
On 1/8/22 12:29, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Mon, 1 Aug 2022 09:02:36 +1000, Clifford Heath <no_...@please.net
wrote:
On 31/7/22 15:37, rbowman wrote:
On 07/30/2022 04:09 PM, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund wrote:
Engineers on the brink of extinction threaten entire tech ecosystems:
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/18/electrical_engineers_extinction/
I think the article has a valid point. I\'ve got hopes for the maker
culture but I don\'t know how many participate. Our new library has a
nicely equipped makerspace with several printers, scanners, laser
cutters and so forth.
The maker movement is mostly made of regret. Teen years wasted playing
video games, didn\'t learn any construction skills, but find themselves
dependent on stuff that other folk have made. Get the urge to know how
to make stuff, but have no-one (but other ignorami) to teach them anything.
Don\'t know how to use a saw or a chisel, but they try to build and use
CNC mills and laser cutters. No idea how to choose the right glue or use
a welder, so they make things in CAD and use a 3D printer. Have never
fixed their bicycle, but they want to build android robots. Don\'t
understand aerodynamics enough to build a good paper dart, but they want
to customize drones.
Sad really.
A manual mill is better to learn on. You can feel the forces.
A plain bastard file or a hacksaw is better still. If you don\'t
understand cutting, you have no business using a cutting machine, let
alone an automated one.
When my uncle (retired watchmaker) started his apprenticeship in the
1950s, one of the first tasks was to cut two rough 2\" cubes, and using
only files and scrapers, to make them into identical cubes such that any
pair of faces would align perfectly on all four edges, and be flat
enough that you could pick up the other block by stiction alone. That
took four months of work.
Without understanding the processes that can turn two rough blocks of
mild steel into perfectly cubic gauge blocks, the rest of the
apprenticeship would have been wasted. As are the efforts of most `makers`.
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 18:39:49 -0600, rbowman <bowman@montana.com
wrote:
On 07/31/2022 03:32 PM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 13:58:38 -0700 (PDT), Simon S Aysdie
gwhite@ti.com> wrote:
On Tuesday, July 26, 2022 at 10:44:08 AM UTC-7, John Larkin wrote:
https://www.studyfinds.org/fear-for-safety-every-day/
What\'s wrong with kids these days? Most have been super-protected
children but are afraid of life.
Engineers have to THINK, blow things up, take calculated risks. Fear
warps prudent judgement.
I\'ve had interns that were afraid to touch a board powered from 5
volts, or handle a 12 volt battery. And wanted eye protection and
masks for everything. And who wouldn\'t crank up a power supply to see
how much an electrolytic cap would leak past abs max voltage rating.
People are terrified of abs max. That\'s an interesting topic, abs max.
Especially for RF parts.
Half of young things are afraid to ride Lyft!
I wonder if all this social media and constant texting creates fear
circles, tribes of wusses, just as it aggregates political tendencies.
PUT YOUR MASK ON, JOHN!!!!!
I only masked for a couple of very good restaurants, which was silly
because as soon as they served water everyone took their masks off.
Some people are still masking, even outdoors. I guess they will for
the rest of their lives.
I went to an Irish festival in the park yesterday and there were only a
few maskers. Some of them lost the masks as the day went on. The 100
degree weather might have been a factor. I can\'t imagine...
Masking is rare now here in San Francisco. People got bored with covid
and all the news now is monkeypox.
I know how to stop the monkey pox epidemic in a week.
We donated our old milling machine to a local maker shop. Now we have
a classic Bridgeport and a new Tormach.
On 1/8/22 12:29, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Mon, 1 Aug 2022 09:02:36 +1000, Clifford Heath <no_spam@please.net
wrote:
On 31/7/22 15:37, rbowman wrote:
On 07/30/2022 04:09 PM, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund wrote:
Engineers on the brink of extinction threaten entire tech ecosystems:
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/18/electrical_engineers_extinction/
I think the article has a valid point. I\'ve got hopes for the maker
culture but I don\'t know how many participate. Our new library has a
nicely equipped makerspace with several printers, scanners, laser
cutters and so forth.
The maker movement is mostly made of regret. Teen years wasted playing
video games, didn\'t learn any construction skills, but find themselves
dependent on stuff that other folk have made. Get the urge to know how
to make stuff, but have no-one (but other ignorami) to teach them
anything.
Don\'t know how to use a saw or a chisel, but they try to build and use
CNC mills and laser cutters. No idea how to choose the right glue or use
a welder, so they make things in CAD and use a 3D printer. Have never
fixed their bicycle, but they want to build android robots. Don\'t
understand aerodynamics enough to build a good paper dart, but they want
to customize drones.
Sad really.
A manual mill is better to learn on. You can feel the forces.
A plain bastard file or a hacksaw is better still. If you don\'t
understand cutting, you have no business using a cutting machine, let
alone an automated one.
When my uncle (retired watchmaker) started his apprenticeship in the
1950s, one of the first tasks was to cut two rough 2\" cubes, and using
only files and scrapers, to make them into identical cubes such that any
pair of faces would align perfectly on all four edges, and be flat
enough that you could pick up the other block by stiction alone. That
took four months of work.
On 07/31/2022 06:43 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking
being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they
start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum --
prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the
bulk stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I didn\'t know what I wanted to do with my life when I entered college at 16.
Today I\'d go for cognitive science but neither that or computer science existed
at the time. FORTRAN IV and punchcards didn\'t light my fire either. It was
years later when I could wirewrap a 8080 board on the kitchen table and make it
do tricks that I started easing into software.
I never did really have a plan. Shit happened and I adapted. The closest I came
to a plan was an attempt to remain in the dying US machine tool business.
You have to \"declare\" a \"course\" (their name for a \"major\") in your
freshman year. Prior to that, everyone is taking the standard engineering
fare of physics, calculus, difeqs, etc. But, at year 2, you need to have
focused on the requirements established for your \"course\".
On 07/31/2022 08:25 PM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 17:43:10 -0700, Don Y
blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum -- prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the bulk
stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I did when I was 10. Electrical engineer.
My family pushed that but I wasn\'t so sure. It\'s a first generation to
go to college thing. Blue collar workers in manufacturing plants see the
engineers as top dogs. It takes a couple of generations before doctors,
lawyers, architects, and so forth become options let alone gender
studies and English literature.
On 7/31/2022 8:52 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 06:43 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking
being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they
start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum --
prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the
bulk stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I didn\'t know what I wanted to do with my life when I entered college at 16.
I\'d already been accepted at another university; I was doing medical research
with a professor, there, and had plans to continue along that path.
I\'d applied to MIT on a whim -- a fellow student had an extra application so
I filled it out sitting in Fysics class that day.
I was mailing my acceptance letter to the first school the day the acceptance
from MIT arrived. Once my folks saw that, the decision was effectively out
of my hands. <frown> I was a bit annoyed but, what can you do?
You have to \"declare\" a \"course\" (their name for a \"major\") in your
freshman year. Prior to that, everyone is taking the standard engineering
fare of physics, calculus, difeqs, etc. But, at year 2, you need to have
focused on the requirements established for your \"course\".
I wanted to design computers (hardware). The EE department had three courses:
6.1 -- traditional EE
6.2 -- something like \"bioelectronic engineering\"? no idea, no one took it!
6.3 -- computer science
There is a core set of classwork / curriculum for all EE\'s (just like there
is a core set of classwork for any student, there) but specialized courses
geared towards the specific course within that department. So, every EE got
a smattering of programming, analog design, digital design, etc. But,
the balance shifted based on which of the three courses you elected.
OBVIOUSLY, the 6.3 tract would teach me how to design computers, right?
frown> After a year, I realized much of what I was taking was regarding
software engineering; AI, compiler/language design, advanced algorithms,
probabilistic systems analysis, etc. So, scurried to find suitable specific
courses that focused more on hardware -- digital labs, etc.
I suspect I ended up with the better education than if I\'d gone the 6.1
route (or, the mystery that was 6.2). Definitely more and better job
prospects. The regular EE\'s could \"program\" but didn\'t know shit about
designing clever algorithms, human interface issues, etc. Ask them to build
an AI and they\'d look at you askance. Or, select a programming language
or OS environment under which to develop (\"You mean there\'s more than
Windows?\")
And, there\'s a very small -- shrinking -- market for designing processors.
I caught the tail end of that and managed to get some satisfaction with
the few that I designed. But, now, it\'s more effective to build a
virtual processor, in software, than to actually fabricate one in hardware!
I am excited to be able to FINALLY use some of the fancier technologies that
I was taught decades back in a real product. \"Multitasking\" was a big yawn
(doing that in products back in the late 70\'s -- without ANY hardware resources
to support it!). Ditto for RT. But, to design a VMM system, build AI\'s,
hot-swap software (and hardware) components, cyptography, DSM, robust security,
human factors engineering, capabilities based ACL, etc. in a *big* way is
something most designs -- let alone EMBEDDED designs -- can\'t even think about!
It\'s nice to see my education was prescient and not obsolete the day the degree
was awarded! (pity the folks taught about *today\'s* technology and wonder how
they\'ll forever be playing catch-up)
Today I\'d go for cognitive science but neither that or computer science existed
at the time. FORTRAN IV and punchcards didn\'t light my fire either. It was
I have a fond memory of punch cards. My first courses used batch submitted
Hollerith cards for job submission. \"Shit! ABENDed on a bad JCL card?\"
On 1/8/22 12:29, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Mon, 1 Aug 2022 09:02:36 +1000, Clifford Heath <no_...@please.net
wrote:
On 31/7/22 15:37, rbowman wrote:
On 07/30/2022 04:09 PM, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund wrote:
Engineers on the brink of extinction threaten entire tech ecosystems:
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/18/electrical_engineers_extinction/
I think the article has a valid point. I\'ve got hopes for the maker
culture but I don\'t know how many participate. Our new library has a
nicely equipped makerspace with several printers, scanners, laser
cutters and so forth.
The maker movement is mostly made of regret. Teen years wasted playing
video games, didn\'t learn any construction skills, but find themselves
dependent on stuff that other folk have made. Get the urge to know how
to make stuff, but have no-one (but other ignorami) to teach them anything.
Don\'t know how to use a saw or a chisel, but they try to build and use
CNC mills and laser cutters. No idea how to choose the right glue or use
a welder, so they make things in CAD and use a 3D printer. Have never
fixed their bicycle, but they want to build android robots. Don\'t
understand aerodynamics enough to build a good paper dart, but they want
to customize drones.
Sad really.
A manual mill is better to learn on. You can feel the forces.
A plain bastard file or a hacksaw is better still. If you don\'t
understand cutting, you have no business using a cutting machine, let
alone an automated one.
When my uncle (retired watchmaker) started his apprenticeship in the
1950s, one of the first tasks was to cut two rough 2\" cubes, and using
only files and scrapers, to make them into identical cubes such that any
pair of faces would align perfectly on all four edges, and be flat
enough that you could pick up the other block by stiction alone. That
took four months of work.
Without understanding the processes that can turn two rough blocks of
mild steel into perfectly cubic gauge blocks, the rest of the
apprenticeship would have been wasted. As are the efforts of most `makers`.
It\'s nice to see my education was prescient and not obsolete the day the
degree
was awarded! (pity the folks taught about *today\'s* technology and
wonder how
they\'ll forever be playing catch-up)
On 8/1/2022 1:51 AM, Don Y wrote:
You have to \"declare\" a \"course\" (their name for a \"major\") in your
freshman year. Prior to that, everyone is taking the standard
engineering
s.b. \"END of freshman year\"
My dad delivered milk. My mom worked in a cafeteria. I was the first
in the family to go to college. But I had a source of dead tube TV
sets and neon sign transformers and WWII surplus radars and flashtubes
so played with them. There\'s not much a kid can do now with a dead
cell phone.
Hey, I\'m having troubles with Dropbox and don\'t trust it to get files
from home to work. So, use a memory stick? I just realized that my
cell phone can work as a memory stick. Duh.
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 17:43:10 -0700, Don Y
blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum -- prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the bulk
stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I did when I was 10. Electrical engineer.
jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 31 Jul 2022 17:43:10 -0700, Don Y
blocked...@foo.invalid> wrote:
On 7/31/2022 5:37 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 07/31/2022 12:51 PM, Don Y wrote:
We\'re targeting the \"junior high\" crowd -- 11 - 13yo. The thinking being
that you want to get them \"pointed\" in a STEM direction before they start
their high school education (which, in many places, requires students to
choose
a business vs. college vs. vocational path for their curriculum -- prior to
that, everyone is largely treated the same)
That makes sense. I assume some slurp it up and ask for more while the bulk
stumble along.
We have \"magnet schools\" here that \"specialize\" in particular subject
areas. Students can freely attend *if* accepted. You\'d not want a
kid to get interested in STEM in his final year in the school system
and have missed out on those years when he *could* have received a
more targeted education (if his interest had been developed sooner).
The goal of the education system should be to provide the best
education appropriate to the needs/desires of the student.
Did *you* know what you wanted to do with your life when you were 14?
I did when I was 10. Electrical engineer.
Age five for me, courtesy of a post-Sputnik kid\'s science program called
\"Discovery 64\". They were interviewing some character in a lab coat who
said something along the lines of, \"Scientific knowledge is growing so
fast that in the future, we\'ll need people who can bring together
several fields--\'synthesists\'.\" (I remember that last coinage quite
vividly.)
The show went off the air the following year, IIRC, so I know when it
was to pretty good accuracy. We chronically underestimate bright
youngsters.