Seconded - years ago I worked with a particularly awful PIC compiler. It would be fine until my compiled output size crossed an unknown threshold. Then it wouldn't just break - it would shatter. Terrible crap. I wasted 6 weeks massaging that POS before I demanded a better compiler. I was new back then.

But there's a twist - my boss was able to make it work, probably because his code lacked any structure and used all global variables. And he STILL uses it for PIC work. But working on bigger projects has gotten him out of many of those bad habits.

These days I experience many more silicon bugs than compiler bugs. And that's on mainstream devices from Microchip and NXP.

Well they will NOW.

Thanks a bunch Snowden.

Have we met on CiF before? I gave that bollocks up years ago.

This is nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with politics and Golden Dawn. The Euro has pushed Greece to the edge, and GD are seeking to exploit the ferment. It's a damn shame, and IMHO the sooner the whole experiment is declared a failure the better, especially for nation states such as Greece. Spain, Portugal, Italy and even France face similar difficulties, on a sliding scale.

I drive about the same, but live in the UK where "gas" costs have always been high. Thing is though, it's still cheaper (and twice as fast) as taking the train. So I'll carry on.

This is about magnets not electronics. China played a 1-2 game first cutting the price of Neodymium magnets making Western production uneconomical, then when the West gave up trying, they trebled the price.

It's a well-known issue wherever a Neodymium magnet is part of a design because they are kinda special in the magnet world. They having a wide B-H curve compared with traditional ceramic magnets, although the latter have higher flux density. It's been 25 years since I properly fiddled with magnets and have never done much serious design.

The West (US, Europe, Japan, South Korea, etc) has no difficulty supplying their electronics needs.

I've had hardware dumped on my desk the *day before* the proto is due to ship. I knocked up enough code in a week and a half, it worked great, and survived virtually intact into production.

But here's the rub: as long as I keep on working miracles, the hardware will keep on getting later.

Am I the only one that misread the summary?

Exactly. All the narcissistic signs are there (hence my RDF post). Industry needs some of that, but too much and you end up with an empire sitting on $100Bn of other people's money and building fc*king James Bond Baddie HQs shaped like the last scene from Close Encounters.

And inherits his RDF.

Every purchase has an emotional dimension. Judging by my friends who own iPhones, I'd say it is considerably higher than average in this case. One even said he decided not to buy another iPhone, but went ahead and did it anyway. He couldn't explain why, and seemed totally happy with that.

Making the EU an even safer haven for terrorists means I will have to take off my shoes again at the airport and probably endure all kinds of suspicion from my "allies".

Wow - thanks for the detail. I spent two years working on a Defib tester with an option on a Pacer tester and for an EE the details can take some learning, especially when your client is in marketing. Most of the two years was spent grappling with immature technology and on UI, though I did have a bit of fun with pulsed biphasic capture in the early days.

Have you ever considered contributing to Wikipedia?

Since ceramic got so good, I haven't needed to specify Tantalum in any of my designs for 5 or more years. In my experience, it is mostly inertia / laziness that keeps designers from exploring alternatives.

Like most engineers, I enjoy the challenge when someone says "you have to use tantalum - nothing else will work". True, Y5V Ceramic has highly voltage-dependent capacitance. So what? Often it's ESR and not absolute capacitance you need, anyway.

"In God we trust" ... not. Power is what you should worship, whether it is cars, money or guns. Power can solve all your problems. America has granted the individual the illusion of personal sovereignty in the full knowledge they can no more exercise it than fly to the moon.

So there are lots of guns, and the cop gangs carry lots more guns just in case. But in practice there's no "just in case" and SOP is to go in with maximum suppressive cover.

It's no surprise stuff like this happens given the parameters the system has been setup with. And there's no easy way back, because of grass-roots indoctrination of the *illusion*. Stupidity and aggression are easy bedfellows.