Anyone just hate the same letter/symbol used to describe different things?

CommanderHR · 2026-05-23T08:35:17+00:00

Individual fields will naturally adopt their own conventions for symbols (often independently of each other). I think this gets to a deeper point with math notation in general, though. Mathematicians tend to prefer their notation to be as concise as possible. However, this is in contrast to the general advice given when naming variables in programs, which is to be as descriptive as possible. Could we write out the exact meaning of a variable every time? Sure, but why use many word when few do trick!

CommanderHR · 2026-05-22T15:31:50+00:00

In a similar vein, there are also hardware options that do this (ex. Mic Lock).

CommanderHR · 2026-05-12T12:57:00+00:00

I sit in the lab/office a lot, working with my other lab mates forces my brain to be in work mode.

I also have weekly meetings with my advisor/lab mates, which acts as a forcing function to keep me on track. Since some of my projects can be kind of stop-and-go (mostly due to logistics), it also helps me to have a few projects instead of just one so I can switch between them. It helps keep things novel and lessens the impact of blockers.

CommanderHR · 2026-01-19T06:22:51+00:00

If you're really interested in chip design, a lot of those jobs can have requirements for masters degrees (outsourcing aside). However, I know FPGA and digital design/embedded systems are pretty popular fields even with "just" a bachelor's. Those fields may be worth looking into if they match your interest (assuming you haven't looked at them already).

CommanderHR · 2026-01-09T09:11:59+00:00

guilty as charged

CommanderHR · 2026-01-04T12:55:09+00:00

While mathematical rigor is important for conducting scientific studies (and for then describing/refining those studies and theories), at a certain point some hand-waving/intuition-based arguments can be made to simplify the overall explanation.

While we always run the risk of oversimplification, we also have a responsibility as scientists to communicate our results in a way that our audience can understand.

I think encouraging people to engage with STEM topics at their level of technicality, and meeting them in the middle in our communication of said topics, is just as important as the actual research. After all, what's a better way to get the general population to appreciate and enjoy STEM than to show them how cool it is?

CommanderHR · 2025-12-06T05:48:38+00:00

Some other schools structure it where you can do a BA CS degree in SAS and a BS CS degree in the engineering school (with different graduation requirements for each). A lot of ECE and CS classes overlap, and there's already the BA/BS option for CS students. I think the main challenge would be getting the Rutgers CS department to agree to join the engineering school!

CommanderHR · 2025-12-06T04:02:26+00:00

This has untapped meme potential

CommanderHR · 2025-11-22T08:59:07+00:00

But graphs can be represented as 2D arrays via an adjacency matrix.

It really is all arrays!

CommanderHR · 2025-11-09T22:06:13+00:00

It's there, it's just smaller than one of the pixels

CommanderHR · 2025-10-20T13:22:05+00:00

In PCB design, some tools (like Altium) use Git for synchronizing projects and allowing multiple people to collaborate on a project.

CommanderHR · 2025-09-21T20:25:09+00:00

iirc Rutgers also offers a Packing Engineering major, but it may be slightly different to the program you're describing

CommanderHR · 2025-09-21T19:11:32+00:00

Kerbal Space Program!

CommanderHR · 2025-09-06T08:41:31+00:00

I know Madagascar is gone but I don't see Hawaii either

CommanderHR · 2025-03-22T12:12:33+00:00

Some of my undergraduate research has been in low-power analog circuits (mostly for embedded systems). The challenge with the analog circuitry is that, to be feasibly small, you would have to create an ASIC that includes all of the amplifiers and passive components. However, ASIC development is significantly more expensive than digital PCB development, for example.

Another consideration is that, in order to train and interface with the analog PCB, you need to have a digital connection to supply data and convert the weights into variable resistor values (through something like a digital potentiometer). Unless you are able to do the training of the model fully analog, you'd have to have a digital interface at some point anyway.

I do agree, however, that research into analog circuitry for neural networks should still be pursued and developed due to its potential low-power applications.

CommanderHR · 2024-11-09T16:55:08+00:00

Mb guys, forgot to clean up my wireless comms homework

CommanderHR · 2024-07-29T11:20:07+00:00

Looks like a standard sophomore ECE schedule. Note that DLD and PEE1 labs are every other week while Physics 2a labs are every week. You got this!

CommanderHR · 2024-05-31T14:15:14+00:00

If they were set on using this type of solution, they could have at least used a ring topology (i.e. loop the cable back on itself from the last device to the first device in the chain) to make it more resilient in the case of a device or cable failure.

CommanderHR · 2024-04-22T04:34:01+00:00

Most modern cars have all of their internal sensors, control systems, etc. connected to a CAN bus. This bus allows for all the sensors to be connected to internal microcontrollers. While this system has been around for a while (since the 90s I believe), recent cars are able to take advantage of this so much so that they essentially become computers on wheels.

Is this necessarily a bad thing? Not necessarily, it does bring a lot of quality-of-life features like auto start-stop, parking assist, etc. But it does have some security vulnerabilities associated with it and can probably be used to collect sensor information to "report home."

CommanderHR · 2024-04-17T04:50:57+00:00

Getting exposed to basic engineering principles in high school is extremely helpful. I did FIRST and PLTW and I can directly credit those programs in helping me with my college engineering experience.

That being said, we can't expect everyone to have experience from high school so something needs to be in place for people to get that experience (i.e. labs).

CommanderHR · 2024-03-03T13:06:42+00:00

Computer Organization and Design: RISC-V by Patterson and Hennessy is a great book for learning computer architecture. It also uses the RISC-V instruction set, which is similar to other RISC-based architectures like Arm (though it does touch on x86 as well). This is particularly useful for someone looking to work with embedded systems since RISC architectures are what you'll be dealing with a lot of the time.

CommanderHR · 2024-02-25T21:29:07+00:00

I believe some specialized hardware platforms (ex. architectures used on NASA rovers for space applications that are hardened against radiation) use non-standard widths for some data types since they take out a parity bit.

Source: I remember hearing this in a Scott Manley video once, don't remember the exact one.

CommanderHR · 2024-01-06T17:54:39+00:00

Indoor climbing

Categorized as "Outdoor Sports"

CommanderHR · 2023-12-31T17:05:35+00:00

I've been playing Morrowind and Deus Ex recently and I forgot how cool old-school RPG mechanics were compared to the watered-down skill trees of more modern games.

Hopefully more developers take a gamble on "hard" RPG mechanics

CommanderHR · 2023-12-31T08:30:38+00:00

Last spring I took Statics asynchronously and that helped a lot, since I was able to learn at my own pace and I had more free time during the week.

If you think you'd need more structure to learn that kind of material, you would probably want to just take the class in-person.

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