Capacitive touch screens dominate modern mobile devices due to their precision and reliability. These screens operate on principles of electrical capacitance - the ability of a system to store an electrical charge. The screen comprises a layer of electrically conductive indium tin oxide (ITO) protected by insulating glass. This arrangement creates a uniform capacitive field across the display surface. When a conductive object, such as a human finger, contacts the screen, it alters the local capacitance by several picofarads. High-precision sensors detect and measure these minute electrical changes to determine the exact contact location.
If you don't have a meter handy - here’s a 12 second video demonstrating how to test a fuse with your phone. Notice one end of the fuse is in contact with my fingers while the opposite end makes contact with the phone screen.
By comparison, resistive touch screens, commonly not found on phones but found in industrial interfaces and ATMs, employ a pressure-based mechanism. This alternative technology sacrifices the responsiveness of capacitive systems for universal input compatibility.
The 555 timer IC is a popular integrated circuit (IC) used in various electronic projects and can be configured to perform a wide range of tasks. It was first introduced by Signetics (now part of ON Semiconductor) in 1972 and has since become one of the most widely used ICs in the electronics industry due to its simplicity and versatility. The 555 timer IC is available in different variants, including the NE555, LM555, and others, with minor variations between them.
The 555 timer operates over a wide range of power supply voltages, typically from 4.5 volts to 15 volts and is typically used in one of three operating modes:
Astable Mode Operation: In this mode, the 555 timer acts as an oscillator, generating a square wave output signal. This mode is commonly used in applications like LED flashers, pulse generators, and tone generators.
Monostable Mode Operation: In this mode, the 555 timer functions as a "one-shot" pulse generator. It produces a single pulse of a specified duration in response to a trigger input. Applications include timers and delay circuits.
Bistable Mode Operation: This mode is used to create a flip-flop circuit, which has two stable states and is often used in simple digital logic applications.
Depending on how a 555 timer is to be used, the appropriate configuration and values for the timing components (R1, R2, and C) must be selected to achieve the desired output characteristics or time delays. Here's some details:
Timing Component Operation: The 555 timer's timing is determined by two resistors (R1 and R2) and a capacitor (C). By choosing appropriate values for these components, you can set the desired time intervals for the timer's operation.
Internal Comparator Operation: The 555 timer includes an internal comparator that compares the voltage across the timing capacitor with two-thirds of the supply voltage and controls the output accordingly.
Output Stage Operation: The 555 timer has an output pin (usually labeled as "OUT") that produces either a high or low signal based on the timing mode and the voltage across the timing components.
Trigger and Reset Input Operation: The IC has a "TRIG" (trigger) input and a "RESET" input. The trigger input is used to initiate certain modes of operation, while the reset input is used to reset the timer and interrupt its operation.
Threshold Input Operation: The "THRS" (threshold) input is used in some applications to override the internal voltage divider.
Here's a short PSpice video I made demonstrating how the 555 Timer can be used in Astable Mode.
The 555timer is still one of the most popular components used in timing-related applications.
In this video I show how to take your MATLAB code and run it on your iPhone.
Here's a list of instructions you can use while watching the video.
In MATLAB on Your Computer
Create a MATLAB script or function.
Document your code by adding explanatory comments at the beginning of the file and within each section.
Publish the code. On the Publish tab, click Publish.
By default, MATLAB creates a subfolder named html, which contains an HTML file and files for each graphic that your code creates. The HTML file includes the code, formatted comments, and output. Alternatively, you can publish to other formats, such as PDF files or Microsoft PowerPoint® presentations. For more information on publishing to other formats, see Specify Output File.
In MATLAB Online™, to allow MATLAB to open output windows automatically when publishing, enable pop-up windows in your Web browser.
After publishing the code, you must share the folder containing the published files. For more information, see Share Folders in MATLAB.
To share a folder from MATLAB®, MATLAB Drive Connector must be running and the folder you choose to share must be in your MATLAB Drive. If you are working in MATLAB Online, you do not need MATLAB Drive Connector to share folders since sharing is always enabled.
This summer I'm building a series of MathWorks MATLAB (short for Matrix Laboratory) videos for an introductory online course I'm putting together at Holyoke Community College.
In this video I fix-up a previously saved tip calculator script in MATLAB. In the next video I'll show you how to transfer the script to your cell phone so you can use it when you eat out!
The course will start from ground zero assuming the student has no experience with MATLAB and work up to some interesting and powerful analysis techniques. Over the summer I’ll be posting additional MATLAB videos as teasers for the complete course.
Want to learn more? Come take a course with me at Holyoke Community College. If you are anywhere in the world and interested in taking an online course, drop an email to gsnyder@hcc.edu Our courses will transfer to most university engineering programs in the United States.
This summer I'm building a series of MathWorks MATLAB (short for Matrix Laboratory) videos for an introductory online course I'm putting together at Holyoke Community College.
In this video I demonstrate how to write, save and run a tip calculator script in MATLAB. In the next video I'll show you how to transfer the script to your cell phone so you can use it when you eat out!
The course will start from ground zero assuming the student has no experience with MATLAB and work up to some interesting and powerful analysis techniques. Over the summer I’ll be posting additional MATLAB videos as teasers for the complete course.
Want to learn more? Come take a course with me at Holyoke Community College. If you are anywhere in the world and interested in taking an online course, drop an email to gsnyder@hcc.edu Our courses will transfer to most university engineering programs in the United States.
This summer I'm creating a series of MathWorks MATLAB (short for Matrix Laboratory) videos for an introductory online course I'm putting together at Holyoke Community College. Here's a new 4 min 52 sec how-to video using a simple restaurant tip calculation as an example. Full course videos and content will get into the MATLAB app with lots of hands-on practical and fun examples.
The course will start from ground zero assuming the student has no experience with MATLAB and work up to some interesting and powerful analysis techniques. Over the summer I’ll be posting additional MATLAB videos as teasers for the complete course.
Want to learn more? Come take a course with me at Holyoke Community College. If you are anywhere in the world and interested in taking an online course rop an email to gsnyder@hcc.edu Our courses will transfer to most university engineering programs in the United States.
Maybe you've got an RV or a boat with four or more house batteries used to power an air conditioner, oven, electric grill, etc. Maybe you've got a cabin off the grid and are harvesting solar energy to charge a battery bank. Ever wonder what those batteries are doing and how they are hooked up?
Want to learn more? I’ll be teaching a Systems 1 course online in the fall and a Systems 2 course in the spring at Holyoke Community College. If you are anywhere in the world and interested in taking an online course with me drop an email to gsnyder@hcc.edu Both courses will transfer to most university electrical engineering programs in the United States.
Foxconn is a Taiwanese multinational electronics contract
manufacturing company headquartered in Tucheng, New
Taipei, Taiwan.
Foxconn currently has 12 factories in nine Chinese cities
along with factories in Asia, Brazil, Europe, and Mexico.
The company is the world's largest contract electronics
manufacturer by revenue that, as of 2012, produced approximately 40 percent of
all consumer electronics products sold.
Foxconn is the largest private employer in China and
one of the largest employers worldwide.
Major customers comprise all the biggies including Apple, Microsoft,
Intel, Amazon, Google, and Dell.
In reaction to a spate of worker suicides in which 14 people
died in 2010, a report from 20 Chinese universities described Foxconn factories as labor camps and detailed widespread worker abuse and illegal overtime. The company claims these issues have been resolved.
And here’s a quick summary of the deal as it currently
stands based on what I’m reading:
The complex will be located at a 1,000-acre site in southeastern Wisconsin.
This will be the first liquid crystal display manufacturing facility in North America and that has environmentalists a little freaked out.
It will take four years to build and will employ up to 10,000 construction workers over those four years.
The factory floor area will cover 20 million square feet.
Up to 13,000 workers could eventually be employed and paid an average of $53,875 a year, plus benefits.
Will generate estimated $181 million in state and local tax revenue annually, including $60 million in local property taxes.
Wisconsin will kick in $3 billion in state incentives over 15 years.
Wisconsin is not projected to break even on the incentive package for at least 25 years (that's 2042).
These projections factor in the maximum of 13,000 workers along with thousands of indirect jobs associated with the project, which Wisconsin officials have said will solidify the Foxconn project as a net win. Foxconn also say they are planning a research and development facility for autonomous vehicle components in Michigan.
The OP-TEC Advanced Technological Education Center was launched in August 2006 with funding from the National Science Foundation. Under the direction of Dan Hull, the Center engages a consortium of two-year colleges, high schools, universities, national laboratories, industry partners, and professional societies. The participating entities have committed to join forces in creating a secondary-to-postsecondary “pipeline” of highly qualified and strongly motivated students and empowering community colleges to meet the urgent need for technicians in optics and photonics.
OP-TEC serves two types of one- and two-year postsecondary programs:
Those devoted to lasers, optics, and photonics technology; and
Those devoted to technologies that are enabled by optics and photonics.
OP-TEC is building support through curriculum, instructional materials, assessment, faculty development, recruiting, and support for institutional reform. OP-TEC will serve as a national clearinghouse for teaching materials; encourage more schools and colleges to offer programs, courses, and career information; and help high school teachers and community and technical college faculty members develop programs and labs to teach technical content.
The project has four goals:
Serve as a national resource center for optics and photonics education and training.
Create, assemble, align, and distribute coordinated curriculum materials designed to support optics, laser, and photonics education in high schools, two-year colleges, and retraining of adult workers.
Support established and new photonics education programs in high schools, community and technical colleges, universities, and professional societies.
Provide education and training for administrators, counselors, high school teachers, and community college faculty members to prepare them to:
design new photonics technology programs that meet their local needs;
infuse photonics into programs in photonics-enabled technologies; and
teach optics, photonics, and lasers using curriculum materials distributed by OP-TEC.
OP-TEC is establishing a national infrastructure for developing and supporting widely disseminated educational programs in cutting-edge, high-demand technologies that require photonics. That infrastructure encompasses both the secondary and postsecondary levels and will involve collaboration between educators and industry personnel.
Dan and his team are doing excellent work. In July I had the chance to interview him (on his birthday!) at the SAME-TEC 2008 Conference in Austin, TX.
You can get more information on the OP-TEC National Center located in Waco, TX here.
***** This is one of many interviews we did at SAME-TEC 2008 and you can watch them different ways:
Streaming and Downloading: View streaming videos and download content using your web browser at: http://nctt.org/podcast
iTunes: If you have iTunes installed you can watch and listen to this one, watch and listen to others, and subscribe to our video and audio podcasts by following this link.
We're planning and looking forward to the SAME-TEC conference next year. Watch this blog and SAME-TEC.ORG for 2009 Conference information and updates.
I'm still picking apart John McCain's technology policy and will have my summary posted before the end of this long weekend.
Earlier this month I wrote about how the National Center for Telecommunications Technologies (NCTT, focusing on information and communications technologies) collaborated with sister NSF Advanced Technology Education Centers of Excellence Maricopa Advanced Technology Education Center (MATEC, focusing on semi-conductor, automated manufacturing and electronics) and OP-TEC (focusing on optics and photonics) to sponsor the SAME-TEC 2008 Conference in Austin, Texas.
SAME-TEC has a long history, starting in 1994 with the vision of David Hata at Portland Community College and continuing to grow and evolve under the leadership and direction of Mike Lesiecki and his team at MATEC.This year the conference had over 350 attendees.
At the conference we did a number of video interviews and John Reynolds, our multimedia specialist, has been hard at work editing them. We've now got the first one posted - an interview with Mike.
There will be many more posted and you can get them different ways:
Streaming and Downloading: View streaming videos and download content using your web browser at: http://nctt.org/podcast
iTunes: If you have iTunes installed you can watch and listen to this one, watch and listen to others, and subscribe to our video and audio podcasts by following this link.
We're planning and looking forward to next years conference. Watch here, our center websites and SAME-TEC.ORG for 2009 Conference information and updates.
SAME-TEC has a long history, starting in 1994 with the vision of David Hata at Portland Community College and continuing to grow and evolve under the leadership and direction of Mike Lesiecki and his team at MATEC.
Last year, while attending SAME-TEC 2007, Dan Hull proposed our three centers collaborate in the 2008 conference and we jumped at the opportunity. The results were greater than I certainly expected. Last week each center focused on it’s own high tech pieces and over 350 attendees had the opportunity to “mix it up” and go to sessions in other disciplines. As the SAME-TEC website notes ~ faculty connected with each other to share practices, knowledge, and new approaches to help students succeed. Industry members connected with educators to ultimately help ensure students emerge into the workforce with the knowledge and skills desired by themselves and employers. Exhibitors connected with existing and potential clients to help determine current and future needs.
Mike’s leadership, Dan’s experience and the work of each center’s team really pulled the conference together nicely. I feel incredibly fortunate to work with such talented and dedicated people.
Of course we had a few hiccups along the way and will learn from them. Next year will be even better – we’ll do it again in collaboration with a number of additional NSF Centers. Watch www.nctt.org, www.matec.org and www.op-tec.org for details.
On July 28-31 we'll be holding our annual National Center for Telecommunications Technologies (NCTT) summer Information and Communications Technology (ICT) conference in Austin, TX. Our National Science Foundation sponsored conference will run as it always has, with lots of great technical ICT sessions and the opportunity for faculty, staff and industry people to connect, learn from each other and have some fun. We are currently formatting the agenda, but here is teaser describing a few of this year's ICT sessions:
ICT Education: International Collaboration
The CNIT department of City College of San Francisco has been approached by several sister educational institutions in foreign countries (Brazil, France and the Netherlands) to establish collaborations at the level of students and faculty. One project has been implemented, while the others are still at the planning stage. The presentation will draw lessons from these pilots and show how these exchanges can bring benefits to both parties.
Ethical Hacking: Hijacking GMail Accounts
Gmail and other online services require a login, but how secure is it? Students will perform two attacks against Gmail--stealing authentication cookies with Hamster, and stealing passwords with a man-in-the-middle attack.
Computer Forensics Advanced Technology Education
View the crime and review the evidence. Connect the pieces.
It's All Fun and Games...And Then Students Learn
This engaging presentation will demonstrate games for learning from simple games for teaching topics like algebra to first-person games teaching algebra and other topics. Games and simulations for teaching math, science and other STEM disciplines will be explored.
Our conferences have always offered opportunities to participate in and learn about leading efforts to advance ICT technical training in the US - this summer it will be even better. In addition, NCTT attendees will have the opportunity to connect and attend technical sessions with two of our sister National Science Foundation centers - MATEC Networks and OPTEC. Here's more info on these Centers:
OP-TEC (The National Center for Optics and Photonics Education) is a National Science Foundation Center that is building a secondary-to-post-secondary “pipeline” of highly qualified and strongly motivated students and empowering community colleges to meet the urgent need for technicians in optics and photonics.
We'll also have a little time to see Austin in the evenings and will definitely get downtown to see the 1 million (or so) bats come out from under the Congress Bridge at sundown:
We're almost full so - if you want to go - you will have to move fast - register here. Join us in Austin if you can!
Thanks for visiting. I'm Gordon, past National Science Foundation Funded Centers of Excellence Director and Co-Director at Springfield Technical Community College and University of Central Florida, past Visiting Engineering Professor at the University of Hartford, currently an Adjunct Computer Science Professor at Pace University and an Adjunct Engineering Professor at Holyoke Community College in Massachusetts. I’ve authored four engineering and engineering technology textbooks and have over 40 years of engineering, technology, communications and IT teaching experience. In addition to my teaching and work with NSF Centers of Excellence, I've served as the Verizon Next Step New England telecommunications curriculum leader and on several business and technology boards around the United States including the Microsoft Community College Advisory Council, the Massachusetts Networking and Communications Council and the National Skill Standards Board.
I am one of the co founders of the Hi-Tec Conference that annually brings 500-600 academic, business and industry representatives to explore the convergence of scientific disciplines, engineering and technologies.
In 2001, I was selected as one of the top 15 STEM faculty in the United States by Microsoft and the American Association of Community Colleges and in 2004 was selected as the Massachusetts Network and Communications Council Workforce Leader of the year.
I am also certified by the International Distance Education Certification Center as a Certified Distance Education Instructor.
