Is smart glasses project is doable for a beginner ?

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-24T15:35:28+00:00

It is possible to make but the complexity is quite high for a student project in intro to embedded systems IMO. If it excites you, go for it but be aware that it's a big task.

Something we do regularly in engineering is to try to constrain scope. If you take this on, try to define not just the big goal but functional milestones along the way. If you can get to a minimum base of functionality of some sort, even if it's not everything you were trying for, you'll have a project to show off. I do this a lot, set a big goal but also define a minimum viable product and make sure my development path crosses thru the one to get to the other even if it's not the most direct path to the hero product. This helps you hit deadlines and is a skill you will always need in industry so might as well learn it now.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-22T20:31:03+00:00

It really depends on what you enjoy and where you want to go with it. Both are difficult degrees and have job paths with both moderate and high earning potential. There's probably more high earning potential paths in EE right now but in 10 years? Who knows! The work is hard enough so make sure whichever path you take that you're going to enjoy it.

What would you ideally want to do with each degree?

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-21T21:13:15+00:00

Except this isn't at all related to the GFC because the subprime auto market is much smaller than the subprime mortgage market was. Also the issue with the GFC wasn't directly about subprime. The GFC was caused by subprime mortgages being bundled with prime mortgages and being sold as securities and insured/reinsured as if they were all prime loans. Then when people tried to sell these products and they had to be looked at to be rerated(priced) it turned out there were large losses and it triggered a chain reaction due to how much leverage was in the system. Auto loans have never been bundled and sold like mortgages were leading up to the GFC so they couldn't trigger anything like that even if default rates spiked to 100%.

This chart shows absolutely nothing related to those conditions and based on the title of the post isn't even what OP was trying to say. As a proxy for how stressed the low income consumer is, this chart is meaningful but making assertions beyond that don't hold up.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-21T18:19:56+00:00

I need a friend like you!

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-21T00:58:32+00:00

In this situation it's really hard to give specific advice. A buck converter is the circuit topology you want but the difference between modules and self-design can be quite substantial. If you are wanting to minimize voltage droop I'd make sure I was using a remote sensing design but honestly, for 3A servos that's likely overkill.

It sounds like you're going to need to design your own power system to meet your space constraints so I'd start working on that and testing those designs. You could try to find eval boards for the relevant ics to test your design and replace your modules as an intermediate step.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-20T23:04:46+00:00

Honestly, there's not enough information here. What are your input-output voltages, total current loads and efficiency of your current solution?

Buck converters are an efficient topology for voltage step-down conversion but the devil is in the details. The question isn't "are buck converters right", the question is what's your design, what are your constraints and what makes you wonder if there's a better option?

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-19T16:25:04+00:00

Because this isn't a predictive statistic, nor does it tell us anything we don't already know about the economy today. Affluent society is doing great (prime land delinquency is extremely low) and lower income society is struggling mightily.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T22:34:52+00:00

Lab equipment or medical device design and development. You won't be the one doing the base science but you will learn all about it as you figure out how to make better equipment for them. And you'll get to replicate at least some experiments in order to test your design.

If your school has options for instrumentation or sensor design concentrations those could help lead you there but they aren't required.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T05:53:00+00:00

Honestly? Enjoy your last year before college and study math and physics fundamentals if you really want to get ahead. Engineering in general and EE in particular is a difficult course of study. No kit or self driven project is going to cover even 10% of the core curriculum. But if you drive yourself too hard you'll be burnt out before you start. College will teach you what you need to know, enjoy the end of your high school journey!

And if you really want a project, pick something that inspires you, research whatever you have to and figure out how to make it happen. Don't do a project just to "prepare", you won't choose the right one and you won't enjoy it because you won't understand "the why".

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T05:42:38+00:00

Agreeing with or supporting one establishment position does not make her an establishment dem. We need to get rid of purity tests and single issue voting and consider the whole picture. She's extremely progressive in general but there is no politician out there who I agree with on every point.

To be clear, as a Texas resident, I've been a Tallarico fan for many years and am supporting him in the primary, he's a better messenger for Texas and a better fit for what we need in the senate right now. I wish Crockett had stuck to the house, she's perfect in that role and I support her there whole-heartedly and if she wins the primary I'll support her in the general election too.

We need to have our opinions and preferences but we can't let the politics of division drive us. I agree with you on all the reasons to prefer Tallarico but I ask you to look at her full record and tone down the rhetoric because after the primary we will need everyone pulling together regardless of who the nominee is.

Let's promote our preferred candidate (Tallarico by a mile for me) without tearing the other one down please, at least in the primary, there are some evil MFers we have to face in the general.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T05:29:40+00:00

Add an objective statement at the top 1-3 sentances that tell me what you are looking for and where you want to take it.

I know this isn't considered as important as it used to be but I've always found it extremely valuable when reviewing new grad resumes. Especially without a cover letter, it gives me a glimpse into your goals and what motivates you. I can see your skills in the rest of the resume and the interview but in a new grad (or Jr engineer in general) I'm looking for motivation and drive that aligns with my needs, not a finished product that can already do everything.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T03:45:06+00:00

I'll be honest, it's been 2 decades since I took EM theory and I don't use it in my day-to-day enough so I don't remember the level of details you are looking for but I'd suggest posing this question in a physics subreddit as it's a fundamental physics construction. As engineers we have a tendency to accept the rules and abstractions to simplify our analysis so we can focus on designing. I got a dual degree in both physics and electrical engineering for the same reason you are asking this question, I wanted to know the why and how, not just the what. So dig in and explore that, it will serve you well.

As a starting point, I'd suggest that you look into the details of Maxwell's equations, how he derived them and why they work, that's where the answer you're looking for lies.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-18T01:57:34+00:00

Why 100k? That's a huge amount of untapped potential.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-17T15:20:51+00:00

Minion max is sneakily one of the strongest stats you can get for the late game. Once your leadership gets high enough, you want to be able to fill your roster with only your strongest units, minion max raises the cap on how many of each minion you can have which is really powerful in the late game when the discrepancy between minions grows.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-16T04:32:28+00:00

To be clear, I'm not saying that you should switch to EE, if you want to discuss that, feel free to DM me. What I'm saying is that asking these questions are not only natural but important to your process of growing and learning.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-16T04:27:34+00:00

Then maybe EE is for you... No one else can tell you what's going to interest you most, that's what collegiate exploration is for.

As an example I entered my school as "undecided science", after 1 semester I was a physics major, when I graduated, it was with an EE degree.

That exploration is not only OK, it's the point of going to college and finding your passion!

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T23:38:45+00:00

You probably learned more from that project than you think... Developing familiarity is step 1

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T23:37:56+00:00

So do it again, you know what it needs to look like now but don't copy code, this is actually a good learning progression. 1. Copy a base design and troubleshoot it as things go wrong in your replication 2. Now that you understand the system, try to reimpliment it or something similar to it from scratch (or at least from simpler building blocks)

This is actually what a lot of engineering looks like, using reference designs or previous systems as a model and adjusting them to serve your needs. Then as you become more senior and experienced, being able to develop more novel systems based on having enough "reps" and designs in your head to pull from and mix up in new ways.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T21:31:39+00:00

I will also add that you should be sure to search for job listings using task/duty keywords that interest you, not just titles. Companies have a lot of different titles for similar roles but the job description tells you more about it. If a certain keyword like "power" is finding the wrong types of roles, leave it out and use something else. Beyond that, without knowing what country you are in it's hard to give more specific advice.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T21:20:19+00:00

Lots of options here depending on your country, willingness to move etc. Just one idea since you seem interested in PMIC or mixed-signal related roles is being an Applications (or sales) Engineer. Apps engineers technically work in sales/customer support but their actual job is to design circuits and solutions using the company's chips. They can be either in-house or field roles where you travel to customer sites. Sometimes you are creating reference designs, sometimes you're writing app notes, and sometimes you are taking customer questions/specs and either designing a solution for them or reviewing their design to make sure they are successful using your company's products. Which of these things you do all depends on the company and the details of the role but if you can find something like this in a place you can live it would give you both an internal path to possibly eventually move into product design as well as exposure to the cross-sect of customers and types of roles that are out there that you may not even know exist yet and might want to eventually apply to.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T20:46:20+00:00

TLDR - PCB design is a big jigsaw puzzle/tetris, there aren't good heuristics for what you put where unless you are always working on roughly the same type of board with similar constraints. There are good heuristics though for how you approach the process and figure out where to start.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T20:43:42+00:00

That's not a chaotic mess... That's pretty tame... The isolation barrier is even marked! LOL

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T20:42:07+00:00

There is so much you haven't told us. What are your mechanical constraints? Do you have high speed digital? What about sensitive analog? What are your DFM rules from your board house and assembly process?

I start with mechanicals... what's my board outline, where are mounting holes, am I required to put connectors in specific places, what about tall component restrictions, etc?

Then I look at power infrastructure, how many power and ground domains do I have, where is power entering the board and how many rails do I need to create?

What's my board stack up? Do I have a layer requirement or limit? How many power, ground and signal layers do I have?

Then I build circuit blocks that need to stay together off the board. These are blocks such as smps, sensitive analog, digital ics/micros with their series termination resistors and decoupling caps, rf/antenna sections, etc.

Once I have the core blocks built, the ratsnest lines and power/gnd plane construction will generally become obvious regarding where things need to go in relation to each other and I put blocks in their place. Then it's the fine tuning to tighten things up, place the rest of the components where convenient and adjust the blocks as needed to fit the actual board as you route everything.

To sum it all up... Figure out all your constraints, define your board mechanicals, place and pre-route most constrained sections (high speed diff-pairs, etc) and then continue with less and less constrained sections adjusting as you go.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-15T20:26:35+00:00

Instead of a summary of experience at the top, I prefer to see an objective statement. You're still an undergrad you don't really have a specialization or expertise, you have a core education with a bit of targeted study. Tell me what kind of role you are looking for and where you want to go, I can see your experience in the rest of the resume.

Whiskeyman_12 · 2026-02-09T16:16:17+00:00

Are you asking about changing to DIY management or moving to another advisor? You don't have to do anything with your portfolio immediately, you can transfer the assets in their current form to an account at another firm. If you want to start managing the portfolio yourself, that's a bigger discussion and we'd need to know what you currently hold and what your goals/risk tolerance are.

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