Your Preference Reveal Your Personality

Ever been asked which type of personality you belong to? Are you the rational (left-brain) or emotional (right-brain), the engineering or artistic type? When it comes to deciding what kind of component symbols to use in schematic diagram, it seems we're faced with the same dilemma.

Not to worry though. I'm sure you already know your preference when it comes to reading or drawing electronic circuits. But in case you're still undecided, this forthcoming book will give you a better idea of your engineering inclinations.

There is really no right or wrong, good or bad when it comes to choosing symbols, ANSI or IEEE. After all, deciphering schematics won't be fun without all the flavors and quirks out there, isn't it?

Have a good weekend and try not to lose sleep over it. (grin!)

Anatomy of a Writer's Dream

For those familiar with the concept of a schematic diagram, there is no need to elaborate further what constitute the elements that made up an electrical or electronic circuit. But for those who want a formal understanding on the anatomy, this is the book to anticipate.

I can't promise you how soon this book will hit the shelve, though. The year end is a busy period for me with much commitments to attend to. Hopefully, I can squeeze out some time to craft a few more pages. As of now, it is about 20% complete.

Like I said before, I take my work very seriously to give my readers an enjoyable reading experience. That means putting the extra effort and time into creating illustrations using Microsoft Visio to give an overall consistency and appeal. It is hard work, so I appreciate those who get my books through honest purchase and leave encouraging comments on Amazon to spur me on.

Next year will be the seventh year into my writing career. It will also be a make or break watershed year for me. My wife and I have been in discussion several times over, whether this move I made six years ago has been worth it, and whether it will be sustainable in the long run. All I can say is the royalties I earned is meagre and heavily supplemented by my wife's income as an admin staff. She is willing to support my dream and passion as an author, and believes in leaving a legacy that will benefit aspiring engineers in the future. For that, I am indebted and grateful to her.

I believe also in giving back to society which is why I continue to contribute a part of my book earnings to charities. It gives my writing a sense of mission and fulfillment, though at the back of my mind, I wish I could afford my wife who stick with me during this trying period a better quality of life. For now, she is content with the simple status as an author's wife. Perhaps next year when I complete my sixth engineering book, I may call it a day and do something else that will provide a steady income and give her a brighter future to look forward to.

So, yeah. I will probably look back with fondness that I've lived my dream for a while, albeit with a tint of sadness that it did not turn out the way I've hoped. Nonetheless, part of my engineering legacy will definitely live on in print. It should be consolation enough for the seven years I will have invested.

Heatsink for M.2 SSD

It is common knowledge that M.2 NVMe SSDs are prone to overheating which can lead to thermal throttling and result in performance degradation. Installing a heatsink brings improvement in temperature and even more so with sufficient air flow. So, I decided on a passive aluminum type 2280 form factor with  top and bottom thermal pads for better heat dissipation.

The red color finish adds a nice touch to the otherwise black and formidable appearance of the ASRock motherboard. Installation was quick and simple, and it cost me only three bucks. Hopefully, this new PC will last as long as my old faithful.

Now back to my writing.

New Desktop

Finally, after 13 years of service and a few interim upgrades, it's time to replace my old faithful E8400 core 2 dual desktop which is showing signs of aging. This time, instead of assembling from scratch, I decided to just order from an online shopping platform. After some comparisons and reading the reviews, this is my choice:

It is an AMD Ryzen 3 3200G CPU running on an ASRock A320M-HDV R4.0 motherboard with 8GB of DDR4 3200MHz memory, housed in a Tecware Nova M mini ATX tower casing with three fans. It came with a 250GB SSD and Windows 10 pre-installed. Price: Sgd 582.

Since the motherboard has a M.2 interface, I was tempted to add an NVMe SSD to give me the extra bit of data storage. Price: Sgd 50.

All in all, I spent a total of Sgd 632 (about 2 months of what I earned from my books) which is quite a good deal. The new PC is fast and incredibly quiet unlike the sound of CPU fan from the old PC which can be annoying at times. Best of all, it has TPM 2.0 which supports Windows 11, though I will not be upgrading to the new OS anytime soon until Microsoft fixes all the bugs and release a stable edition.

The Many Faces of Circuit Diagrams

I'm not sure how things were when you started learning to read circuit diagrams. As far as I'm concerned, I only learned about the term 'schematic' much latter when I fiddled with EDA tools in the early days of my employment. So in reality, I always refer to electrical drawings as circuit diagrams. Of course, many electronic engineers begin their journey as a hobbyist building simple to sophisticated projects, usually from kits sold in electronics shops, to those found in electronics magazines.

I had my fair shares of fun and frustrations in building those electronic kits and projects. But it was through all the hard knocks that I learned how to decipher circuit diagrams. You might not believe or even seen one of these symbol templates that engineers used to draw circuits before the advent of EDA software.

I do miss the good old days but given a choice, I'd rather not go back to drawing circuits by hand. Electronics engineers never have it so good in this twenty-first century.

The Art of Learning

Albert Einstein once said, "Any fool can know; the point is to understand." There are those who learn by reading, and there are those who learn by doing. Every person has a different way of learning and degree of understanding what he or she has learned. Of course, teachers play an important role in cultivating the interest of learning in their students, but how a teacher teaches a subject will determine to some measure how a student learn with understanding.

That's why it's essential for any aspiring book author to lay out a clear objective when setting out to write on a specific subject. This should be stated upfront to let the readers know what to expect and what the book aims to achieve. While a book can be informative in content and engaging in style, it is the reader's mindset that will ultimately decide how much he or she will gain from reading. Learning and teaching go hand in hand, so we can't talk about the art of learning without including the art of teaching, and more:

The art of teaching is patience and clarity; the art of learning is listening and asking the right questions; and the art of understanding what you learn is knowing how to relate the facts to experience.

Now you know, but do you understand?

New Book Cooking

Can you make out the following words?

This is the title to the next book that I am currently working on. I have intentionally chosen a rather cryptic font for the chapter titles to reinforce the idea of its content. Not to worry, the rest of the text will be normal and readable.

Somehow, it brought to mind the recent Marvel blockbuster, Shang-Chi, which critics initially deemed to be a failure due to the anti-Sino sentiments which past Hollywood movies tend to portray. But Chinese kung-fu has a kind of attraction that is irresistible, and now coupled with cinematic effects makes it all the more appealing to the viewers of this ancient martial art form. It reminds me of the Hong Kong comic series Dragon-Tiger Gate that I grew up reading, which brought back a sense of nostalgia:

Hopefully, when this new book is released (not any time soon), readers will catch a glimpse of its aura in my writings. As I always believe, engineering books should not be dry or boring; rather, they should be engaging in a way to fire the passion and imagination of the readers, so that the learning journey is both enjoyable and enriching.

For those who have read my books, I welcome your comments and thoughts.