Electrical Engineering V3 - Developers

Doing some system analysis in python instead of matlab: [url]https://drluke.space/jupyter.html[/url] (Excuse the german, just look at the pictures) The university is of course heavily pushing the use of Matlab, but everyone who used Matlab before knows that it's preferrable to use something else if possible.

[QUOTE=DrDevil;50514703]Doing some system analysis in python instead of matlab: [url]https://drluke.space/jupyter.html[/url] (Excuse the german, just look at the pictures) The university is of course heavily pushing the use of Matlab, but everyone who used Matlab before knows that it's preferrable to use something else if possible.[/QUOTE] Matlab is really beneficial to control system engineers and mathematicians, but is it's language/syntax wonky compared to C.

[QUOTE=LoneWolf_Recon;50514836]Matlab is really beneficial to control system engineers and mathematicians, but is it's language/syntax wonky compared to C.[/QUOTE] It's beneficial if you don't have any other programming skills, but as a programmer I always was diguisted by the language.

[QUOTE=DrDevil;50514703]Doing some system analysis in python instead of matlab: [url]https://drluke.space/jupyter.html[/url] (Excuse the german, just look at the pictures) The university is of course heavily pushing the use of Matlab, but everyone who used Matlab before knows that it's preferrable to use something else if possible.[/QUOTE] Uh... what? Matlab is amazingly useful. I use it every day at my internship dealing with DSP, signal processing, and SDR's. And I mean everyday. Its what all the employees use before translating to C for performance reasons. It also wasn't forced on them, they all said they chose it because it was the best tool for the job.

I strongly disliked Matlab but then later saw it is quite useful for linear-algebra stuff, also supports anonymous functions which is always good. Working in Matlab is enjoyable, but quite hard at first.

[QUOTE=Dolton;50517402]Uh... what? Matlab is amazingly useful. I use it every day at my internship dealing with DSP, signal processing, and SDR's. And I mean everyday. Its what all the employees use before translating to C for performance reasons. It also wasn't forced on them, they all said they chose it because it was the best tool for the job.[/QUOTE] Well I suppose it depends on how you use it. I once worked at an mechanical engineering institute for some time, and they did all of their post-measurement signal processing in Matlab. That required some reading of files to get data from sensors that dumped it in some weird ass format, and boy would it have been nice to use python at that point. Matlab ist good at doing matrices, but sucks at everything else as a language.

[QUOTE=DrDevil;50518937]Well I suppose it depends on how you use it. I once worked at an mechanical engineering institute for some time, and they did all of their post-measurement signal processing in Matlab. That required some reading of files to get data from sensors that dumped it in some weird ass format, and boy would it have been nice to use python at that point. Matlab ist good at doing matrices, but sucks at everything else as a language.[/QUOTE] Weird fortmat file -> Python Script to a .bin file (just a series of floats or something) -> MATLAB fread() ? I read data from an SDR receiver, quickly run a python script on it, then import the signal MATLAB. It takes maybe 10 seconds to do.

[QUOTE=DrDevil;50518937]Well I suppose it depends on how you use it. I once worked at an mechanical engineering institute for some time, and they did all of their post-measurement signal processing in Matlab. That required some reading of files to get data from sensors that dumped it in some weird ass format, and boy would it have been nice to use python at that point. Matlab ist good at doing matrices, but sucks at everything else as a language.[/QUOTE] There are all kinds of good uses for it, the 2016 edition contains some pretty useful stuff for rapid "big data" (so much hatred for that phrase) analysis, we also use it for real time engine modelling, control systems validation, as well as algorithm verification in a nice visually understandable way. It has a shedload of uses, but it is a tool and it cannot do everything. Just because it doesn't suit your uses doesn't make it a bad one.

If you're just working with numpy, everything's already handled in C or FORTRAN, really, so Python has that advantage. I wouldn't touch Matlab simply because it's proprietary garbage.

FUCK! CUNT! DICKS! ASS MOTHERFUCKING GODDAMMIT SON OF A BITCH. I just recapped an older motherboard that originally used lytic capacitors with slightly more reliable tantalum stuff. After all was said and done I plugged it in and it proceeded to explode several times and catch fire from exploding tantalum capacitors. How did I fucking miss the memo that the brown stripe on tantalum IS NOT THE NEGATIVE SIDE? AAAAAAAA.

[QUOTE=pentium;50522812]FUCK! CUNT! DICKS! ASS MOTHERFUCKING GODDAMMIT SON OF A BITCH. I just recapped an older motherboard that originally used lytic capacitors with slightly more reliable tantalum stuff. After all was said and done I plugged it in and it proceeded to explode several times and catch fire from exploding tantalum capacitors. How did I fucking miss the memo that the brown stripe on tantalum IS NOT THE NEGATIVE SIDE? AAAAAAAA.[/QUOTE] That must've been quite some firework!

Fuck blue smoke, we had [highlight]FIRE![/highlight]

I never trust tantalums, and their benefits never really impress me when I could do the same with ganged aluminum electrolytics or ceramics.

Aren't they often nick-named "Tantrum" capacitors for a reason? [editline]14th June 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=pentium;50522812]FUCK! CUNT! DICKS! ASS MOTHERFUCKING GODDAMMIT SON OF A BITCH. I just recapped an older motherboard that originally used lytic capacitors with slightly more reliable tantalum stuff. After all was said and done I plugged it in and it proceeded to explode several times and catch fire from exploding tantalum capacitors. How did I fucking miss the memo that the brown stripe on tantalum IS NOT THE NEGATIVE SIDE? AAAAAAAA.[/QUOTE] They typically also have a small + mark on them, don't they?

No, they normally have a brown stripe. I'm so used to using lytics that I keep thinking that the stripe indicated the negative side. This does not apply to tantalum.

[img]http://i.imgur.com/3i09utR.png[/img]? That and so far, every random circuit board I've grabbed that has a tantalum cap on it has the + mark just below the stripe as well, even on the reddish ones with the white markings instead of the traditional yellow/brown.

oh, that's through-hole stuff. I'm working with this shit: [img]http://i00.i.aliimg.com/img/pb/521/140/504/504140521_374.jpg[/img] ...which I could only find a proper photo for AFTER I figured out the polarity.

Logic would tell me that if it applies to the thru-hole, it might apply to the SMD version too. (the band thing) Oh well, water under the bridge at this point. Damn shame what happened.

Can I vindicate myself a little? [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTkiB_WpF1k[/media] [editline]sadsa[/editline] Ddrl46, this is a pre-emptive warning to shut the hell up about my soldering. My setup is Cheeki-Breeki in comparison to your fancy setup and expensive pastes. :v:

[QUOTE=pentium;50526290]Can I vindicate myself a little? [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTkiB_WpF1k[/media] [editline]sadsa[/editline] Ddrl46, this is a pre-emptive warning to shut the hell up about my soldering. My setup is Cheeki-Breeki in comparison to your fancy setup and expensive pastes. :v:[/QUOTE] You should really only have solder on one pad when placing SMD components :smile:

Get some flux up in there!

[IMG]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a166/ballsandy/IMG_4294.jpg[/IMG] I don't know why it's so hard for me to love the open-source community. 3/4 of their shit is blatent copies of commercial products, plus a touch of incompatibility for no real reason. [b]Whose fucking awesome idea was it to replace pin headers with fucking terminal blocks?[/b]

[QUOTE=pentium;50533791][IMG]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a166/ballsandy/IMG_4294.jpg[/IMG] I don't know why it's so hard for me to love the open-source community. 3/4 of their shit is blatent copies of commercial products, plus a touch of incompatibility for no real reason. [b]Whose fucking awesome idea was it to replace pin headers with fucking terminal blocks?[/b][/QUOTE] You mean 3/4 of the commercial hobbyist focused products are blatant copies of open source work with a 'spin' on it for uniqueness?

[QUOTE=nuttyboffin;50534518]You mean 3/4 of the commercial hobbyist focused products are blatant copies of open source work with a 'spin' on it for uniqueness?[/QUOTE] Sometimes you'll get one of these knock offs with proprietary libraries/code that make it hard to port. Other times, you just see them blatantly use Sparkfun or Adafruit libraries.

[QUOTE=pentium;50533791][IMG]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a166/ballsandy/IMG_4294.jpg[/IMG] I don't know why it's so hard for me to love the open-source community. 3/4 of their shit is blatent copies of commercial products, plus a touch of incompatibility for no real reason. [b]Whose fucking awesome idea was it to replace pin headers with fucking terminal blocks?[/b][/QUOTE] I actually like the terminal block idea.....

[QUOTE=gjsdeath;50534891]I actually like the terminal block idea.....[/QUOTE] Yeh, we use the arduino nanos with the breakout board all the time at work (and I at home too)

I wrote a short intro or tutorial on why logarithmic scales are cool: [url]https://drluke.space/uni/srt/additional/logintro.html[/url] Maybe it'll help someone here. Feel free to suggest improvements!

[QUOTE=gjsdeath;50534891]I actually like the terminal block idea.....[/QUOTE] If I wanted to put something in a box (which I'm about to do with an arduino mega) I would much prefer terminal blocks than pin headers.

[QUOTE=pentium;50533791][IMG]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a166/ballsandy/IMG_4294.jpg[/IMG] I don't know why it's so hard for me to love the open-source community. 3/4 of their shit is blatent copies of commercial products, plus a touch of incompatibility for no real reason. [b]Whose fucking awesome idea was it to replace pin headers with fucking terminal blocks?[/b][/QUOTE] Honestly, if you're prototyping something that moves a lot, terminal blocks aren't necessarily a bad choice.

[QUOTE=Cakebatyr;50535928]If I wanted to put something in a box (which I'm about to do with an arduino mega) I would much prefer terminal blocks than pin headers.[/QUOTE] I would like it because if I'm working on a project and haven't finalized the wiring, it would be nice to just unscrew it instead of having to re-solder everything. Although, I know some people would prefer to only mount the processor itself to their project instead of the entire Arduino prototyping board, but I don't have time for that shit.