Question to all the #ee or #electronics experts here: I have two TI chips here. the one in the background is from 1985 and has shiny legs. The one in the foreground I bought in the last 5 years new from Mouser. It came with those tarnished legs already from the factory. Why are the legs so tarnished? What coating does TI use that makes it so black looking. I understand that back in the 70s supposedly TI used a silver coating that turned black over the decades, but this is something different...?

Wer bei solcher Solarleistung, selbst unserer Mini-Anlage nicht in Verzückung gerät, muss ein Petrolhead sein. Im März praktisch kein Tag in den letzten Tagen, an dem die Batterie nicht geladen war und zur Autoarkie beigetragen hat. So macht Energiewende Spaß. Die Anlage der Größe kriegst du mittlerweile für 4 stellige Beträge. Die grüne Linie ist die Batterieladung.

So when you have a bunch of jellybean JFETs (2N5457), time to burn, and a handful of 1uF bipolar capacitors…
What to do..

I decided to build a simple amplifier Although many find JFETs aren’t quite as intuitive as a regular BJTs, they’re not THAT scary and they’re easily biased, using a megaohm sized resistor from the gate to ground.

To be able to do some more accurate calculations, I decided to measure the maximum drain current, IDSS, and the negative Gate-Source cut-off (pinch off) voltage, as they can vary significantly even between devices even from the same batch.

A fun evening in the lab

Russia’s threat is rising, says Estonia’s ambassador to Australia — Capital Brief

Last month, a little-reported publication issued a stark warning about where Russian President Vladimir Putin could be looking…
#Estonia #EE #Europe #Europa #EU
https://www.europesays.com/1891343/

#Digital Voice switchover cut off 95-year-old's landline

My 95-year-old friend is in distress. His #landline has stopped ­working & he’s told by his provider #EE that he may need to accept a new phone number to get his ­service back

He lives alone & relies on his phone for human contact

It will be a challenge for him to let ­people know his new number and he risks being cut off from #medical #communications

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/feb/24/digital-voice-switchover-cut-off-my-95-year-old-friends-landline

More than four decades ago, I took #quantum mechanics as an undergraduate #EE student, as a required course on semiconductors. We used a then-popular #physics textbook on the subject—"Solid State and Semiconductor Physics" by McKelvey. Suffice it to say, this physics textbook wasn't ideal for #engineering students.

Today, I came across Prof. #Dommelen's free textbook, "Quantum Mechanics for Engineers", in all its 1600-page glory. And I'm loving it!

https://web1.eng.famu.fsu.edu/~dommelen/quantum/pdf/index.pdf

Those of you who make PCBs in the EU, what surface finish do you use?

Please boost for reach, if you don't mind...

Edit: whether you're in the EU or you send boards to the EU. Either way.

I was in a gastropub for a works Christmas meal on Friday. In spite of being in 5G LTE area, #mobile #Internet was heavily lagged and barely anything worked. Network Cell info showed device hunting between 800 MHz, 1800 MHz and 2100 MHz. I didn't have my RF Explorer with me (or I would have been highly tempted to scan the airwaves!) but either #EE / #BT cannot handle the traffic in that area, or Christmas tree lights in the pub are chucking out wideband RF #interference (both are possible!) >>

120 millones de personas decidieron no votar en #EE.UU

– Insurgente. Tu diario de contrainformación
https://insurgente.org/120-millones-de-personas-decidieron-no-votar-en-ee-uu/

So we have an #EE engineer booked for this morning.
Difficult to reach #Rural broadband in #Herefordshire is an afterthought.
#Gigaclear had the contract specifically for hard to reach areas, but shockingly, once the towns and villages were in, the actually hard to reach areas were left hanging.
#privatisation of public #utilities and #infrastructure is nothing more than syphoning off public funds.

New 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗹 (Ghost in the Shell) article named 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝘃𝗶(𝟭) 𝗘𝗱𝗶𝘁𝗼𝗿 (Use vi(1) Editor) available.

https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2024/09/23/ghost-in-the-shell-part-8-use-vi-editor/

New 𝗚𝗵𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗹 (Ghost in the Shell) article named 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝘃𝗶(𝟭) 𝗘𝗱𝗶𝘁𝗼𝗿 (Use vi(1) Editor) available.

https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2024/09/23/ghost-in-the-shell-part-8-use-vi-editor/

If feel like 5 years ago you could travel anywhere including the USA and use your mobile phone at the same costs as if you were in the UK (subject to a lower data fair use limit).

I've just looked up roaming now and everywhere seems to be at least £5 per day. Why ;( ?

Warum muss man eigentlich immer ein ganzes Jahr auf tolle Dinge warten? Ich will wieder aufs #EE!

Selbst wenn bei mir dieses Jahr etwas der Wurm drin war (nur ein bisschen, ich hatte auch sehr viele tolle Erlebnisse), ich vermisse es jetzt schon und freu mich tierisch aufs nächste Jahr.

Die #CDU verhindert im extrem dünnbesiedelten MV gemeinsam mit der "Heimat" (#NPD) und #NoAfD einen Solarpark.

Die Koalition der Ewiggestrigen steht gemeinsam gegen den Fortschritt.

#EE

https://www.nordkurier.de/regional/anklam/cdu-stoppt-mit-ex-npd-mega-solarpark-in-vorpommern-2715592

#Computing used to have so many dichotomies:

• compiled v interpreted
• structured v unstructured
• objective v functional
• manual memory management v automatic garbage collection
• typed v untyped
• statically typed v dynamically typed
• strongly typed v weakly typed
• lazy evaluation v eager evaluation
• pass by value v pass by reference
• camel case v snake case
• \(\texttt{begin...end}\) v \(\texttt{{...}}\)
• indentation v brackets
• two spaces v four spaces
• mainframes v minis
• Emacs v Vi
• UNIX v VMS
• and tonnes of others

Some people got quite hot, defending their positions. We'd defuse the unpleasantness with "It's all 0s and 1s in the end", which was our version of "Can we all just get along?".

Today, though, advances in #CS theory, #EE hardware design, and #IT software practices have muted, if not entirely mooted, these once-controversial issues.

Pity—those petty disputes were loads of fun.