Technical nonfiction and spec fiction. She/her. Melbourne, Australia. Generation X. Admin of Outside of a Dog. BDFL of Hometown (Mastodon) instance Old Mermaid Town (@futzle@old.mermaid.town). Avatar image is of a book that my dog tried to put on their inside.
My rating scale: ★ = I didn't care for it and probably didn't finish it; ★★ = It didn't inspire but I might have finished it anyway; ★★★ = It was fine; ★★★★ = I enjoyed it; ★★★★★ = I couldn't put it down.
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You are abducted by aliens known as the U-Ty Masters to be placed in their …
Content warning An old joke about a Choose Your Own Adventure book
I've read 95% of this book but I'm not sure I can finish it.
At the turn of the twenty-second century, scientists make a breakthrough in human spaceflight. Through …
I finished this book a couple of weeks ago. Like all of Chambers's books, it feels as though nothing much is going on in them at any given moment, but in a good way. There are interpersonal relationships continuously developing and evolving, there's the discoveries about the planets that the explorers land on, and then there is the revelation about events back on Earth which the explorers, 17 light years away, can do nothing about.
For such a simple and shortish story, I found the revelation at the end to be suitably profound, as well as the way Chambers left unanswered, but in a satisfying way, some of the questions about what had happened back on Earth.
I have read some more of this book. It comes across as fantasy but it will probably veer into sf territory, given that's what the author's typical fare is. I wish there was less gender essentialism in it, but that's sadly common in this genre.
Received this as a birthday present recently. I hope Dave Barry is as funny as I found him 25 years ago.
Got this book off @pelagikat@eigenmagic.net. Still not sure I'm going to finish it.
The Art of Electronics, by Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill, is a popular reference textbook …
Golly, this book is a brain-burner, but it was the first time I really understood semiconductors. And I include the Electronics subject I did at university in that.
This textbook starts from the basics of passive components (resistors, capacitors, inductors) and by chapter 3 transistors have been covered. From there it's on to signal processing, amplification, rectification, and, inevitably digital circuits (which are, to me, less interesting).
A critical thing I noticed is that the stereotypical rookie-advanced circuit, the astable multivibrator, isn't in this book at all. There's a digital implementation with chained flip-flops, but the version with two transistors criss-crossed is nowhere to be seen. This comforts me, because the multivibrator just isn't as important in the real world as everyone makes out, and it's actually super-hard to understand.
Because it's a textbook, it has broad coverage of so many topics and it doesn't always delve into every corner …
Golly, this book is a brain-burner, but it was the first time I really understood semiconductors. And I include the Electronics subject I did at university in that.
This textbook starts from the basics of passive components (resistors, capacitors, inductors) and by chapter 3 transistors have been covered. From there it's on to signal processing, amplification, rectification, and, inevitably digital circuits (which are, to me, less interesting).
A critical thing I noticed is that the stereotypical rookie-advanced circuit, the astable multivibrator, isn't in this book at all. There's a digital implementation with chained flip-flops, but the version with two transistors criss-crossed is nowhere to be seen. This comforts me, because the multivibrator just isn't as important in the real world as everyone makes out, and it's actually super-hard to understand.
Because it's a textbook, it has broad coverage of so many topics and it doesn't always delve into every corner of electronics. Its intent is to get you up to speed with circuit design, but it'll take a few rereadings before I think I'll get even close to that.
The dry humour of the authors is noted and appreciated. I may post some choice quotations here in the future.