Electrical Conductivity and Resistivity

I guess “conductivity” and “resistivity” are terms relatively simple to explain to the general public. Conductive materials conduct electrical currents easily, and resistive materials resist electrical currents. So what should an engineer know about these terms that the general public does not generally know? By knowing how they are defined, and knowing the difference between resistivity and conductivity, and resistance and conductance.

No, this is not about "Resistance: Fall of Man" game (image taken from Best Game Wallpapers).

Metal whiskering

Do you know that not only mice and felines grow whiskers? Metals do too! Surprise surprise! To system and electronic engineers however this is an unpleasant surprise, a nightmare that they wish never will happen in their products. This phenomenon gain so much attention that high tech companies such as Lockheed Martin and NASA are still trying to understand it.

The removal of lead from solders increases the chances of tin whisker occurring. The phenomenon of whiskering had caused multimillion havocs, including the false alarm of Millstone nuclear plant, Swatch watches recall and the lost of Galaxy IV satellite (image taken from The Guardian).

Semiconductor Technology: Moore's Law

Just look at that brick handphone. Does it seem like it was ages ago that telephones started to become mobile? The first hand-held mobile phone is, infact, not even 50 years old yet. First to be introduced in 1973 and commercially available by 1980's to customers who could afford to buy it (costs about USD 4000 back then, which is equivalent to USD 9300 today!) and don't mind carrying a 1 kg extra weight in their briefcase/handbag.

By contrast, today's mobile phones costs and weights only a small fraction of the earliest brick mobile phone and packs more computing power and has more fuctions and capabilities than one could ever imagine back then. All this thanks to Moore's Law.

Analog vs Digital

One might have easily heard this hundreds of times - "We are now entering the realm of the digital age" or something along that line. What does that mean, and how much did "digital" influence our life?

To put it simply, a digital system presents data by using discrete or discontinuous values. In other words, there are only yes and no, 0 and 1. Or it may be 1, 2, 3, 4 and so on, but nothing is envisioned or accepted between the numbers, so there is no such thing as 1.4 in a discrete system. If the system is 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4 and so on, then 1.27 is not accepted within the system as well. You get the picture.

On the other hand, its counterpart, an analog system, uses continuous values for data presentation. Within this system, the data could be divided down infinitesimally. Not satisfied by the data value of 1.2, feeling that it is not accurate enough? Drill deeper and you may get 1.26. Deeper more and you may get 1.257. And so forth the value goes.

Folding Plug

Ever thought of the fact that however portable and sleek your laptop or latest gadget is, the huge rectangular plug with its 3 bronze pins sticking out totally diminishes the definition of "sleek"? No matter how innovation is done on every part of an electronic device, the plug is the one with almost nonexistent change as far back as anyone could recall.

Folding Plug can, as its name suggests, be folded and carried with greater mobility (image taken from The Guardian).

Virtual Sky - Working under an Open Sky

Do you feel happy working under a clear blue sky as opposed to working in a stark office environment? Are your office employees shuffling around like zombies, or nodding off to a sleepy start in the conference room during meetings? Then fear not, for Virtual Sky will improve your employees productivity by providing them a chance to work under the infinite horizon of a clear blue sky! Or so that is how it goes...

This is how I work ever day (not the Party Rock way...)

Reading a recent news article from the technology section, I went in search for more information regarding this new innovation. Developed by Stuttgard-based Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering, or IAO in short (Institut fur Arbeitswirtschaft und Organisation) and exhibited in CeBIT Trade Fair in Hannover in March 6-12, 2012 was a matrix of ceiling lighting panels simulating clouds moving across a clear sky.

What I "think" do vs. What I "really" do

"Hello world"

That phrase is one of the memorable words I learned to program in Computer Programming class. And those exact words is what I would like to greet you all with in my first post here as a guest blogger. I am very much excited to share some of my thoughts and experiences here and I do hope we all could exchange ideas along the way.

In the past few weeks, we've seen these meme about "What others think I do vs What I actually do..." one too many times. Most of these reproductions are really funny, quite to an extent that it is a chilling truth that we hate to admit.

(My notes today will talk about electronic engineering in general, but maybe it could relate to other engineering fields.)

Uni-signal - Traffic Light for Color Blind

If you think that there would not be any new designs that will surprise you the way i-whatever did, think again. Especially when you were rushing the red light. Surfing across the web in a lazy evening brought to my attention the design of Uni-signal, a traffic light with a slight variation from the norm. 

Uni-signal light - a new idea for the color blind (image taken from Yanko Design website).