Toyman01 wrote: So the true question, and the one we probably will never answer completely, is why. Why this place, and why it has stayed cohesive for so long.
I think you answered your own question:
Toyman01 said: As a group, we also tend to spend most of our time learning. Not in a official way, but just satisfying curiosity. And with that insatiable curiosity, comes the love of sharing what we learn.
RevRico wrote: How do you make RAM? Like, how did the concept, and then hardware combination, evolve to become RAM? BUILDING A computer from parts is easy, building parts for a computer is magic.
Nah, RAM is actually pretty simple. As with most things in computing, it seems really complicated but it's really built out of a zillion little tiny simple things.
You start with a transistor, a voltage controlled switch. You can put 3 or 4 transistors together to make a logic gate (AND, OR, etc), then you can use 3 or 4 of those logic gates to build something called a "flip-flop". A flip-flop is one bit of memory, you can store a value of 0 or 1 in it and then read it back later. Add 7 flip-flops next to it and now you've got a byte of memory. Replicate that assembly another 1023 times and you've got a 1K SRAM (static RAM) chip.
(DRAM is a bit different, it involves capacitors and has a bunch of compromises in order to get the size and the cost down).
In reply to RossD:
So, if I have two sprockets, one is 14 tooth and the other 56. Running 530 motorcycle chain. How far apart do the centers of the two sprockets have to be?
Inquiring challenge cars want to know.
Slippery wrote: Why did the chicken cross the road?
To prove to the squirrel it could be done.
What was the intended name for Sagamore Hill, Teddy Roosevelt's home in Oyster Bay on Long Island?
In reply to vwcorvette:
Without googling it was supposed to be named for his wife that died but that name escapes me.
codrus wrote:RevRico wrote: How do you make RAM? Like, how did the concept, and then hardware combination, evolve to become RAM? BUILDING A computer from parts is easy, building parts for a computer is magic.Nah, RAM is actually pretty simple. As with most things in computing, it seems really complicated but it's really built out of a zillion little tiny simple things. You start with a transistor, a voltage controlled switch. You can put 3 or 4 transistors together to make a logic gate (AND, OR, etc), then you can use 3 or 4 of those logic gates to build something called a "flip-flop". A flip-flop is one bit of memory, you can store a value of 0 or 1 in it and then read it back later. Add 7 flip-flops next to it and now you've got a byte of memory. Replicate that assembly another 1023 times and you've got a 1K SRAM (static RAM) chip. (DRAM is a bit different, it involves capacitors and has a bunch of compromises in order to get the size and the cost down).
So then how did we decide/come up with a transistor and the resulting logic gates? I'm not trying to be a hootus, I've even taken classes in electrical engineering, including assembly language, and the teacher could never give me a good answer. It was asking how the hardware knew how to interpret the assembly language that stalled out the class one day.
To me it just seems so strange that some wire, some plastic, and some silicon can do all kinds of things on its own and be controlled. The whole train of thought that led to figuring it out just amazes me, in part because I don't think I ever got a good history lesson.
I got a better question we don't know. How are there over 500 channels available and absolutely nothing to watch?
codrus wrote:RevRico wrote: How do you make RAM? Like, how did the concept, and then hardware combination, evolve to become RAM? BUILDING A computer from parts is easy, building parts for a computer is magic.Nah, RAM is actually pretty simple. As with most things in computing, it seems really complicated but it's really built out of a zillion little tiny simple things. You start with a transistor, a voltage controlled switch. You can put 3 or 4 transistors together to make a logic gate (AND, OR, etc), then you can use 3 or 4 of those logic gates to build something called a "flip-flop". A flip-flop is one bit of memory, you can store a value of 0 or 1 in it and then read it back later. Add 7 flip-flops next to it and now you've got a byte of memory. Replicate that assembly another 1023 times and you've got a 1K SRAM (static RAM) chip. (DRAM is a bit different, it involves capacitors and has a bunch of compromises in order to get the size and the cost down).
Yeah, but it's done at such a small scale that you can only SEE the ridiculous things with an electron microscope. They're "printed" more than manufactured. But even knowing how it's done.......it's just magic.
Has anyone ever become a pilot without learning it from a pilot who learned the skill in a direct descendent from Orville Wright?
RossD wrote: Quick without looking it up: What is the definition of a British Thermal Unit otherwise known as a BTU?
Its like a calorie, but with a pretentious mealy-mouthed accent.
Ever used a BNC connector? (Primarily for composite video, sometimes antennas).
Do any of you fine folk know what BNC stands for?
mazdeuce wrote: I know how to knit, but what I don't know is how the machines that make the knits for T-shirts and the like work. Do they have teeny tiny knitting needles moving really fast?
In essence, yes, that's pretty much how they work. I grew up next to a small knitting factory, mum still works there nearly 25 years later making garments for them. I used to love watching the machines in action, it was all old mechanically controlled stuff. Pretty much everything worked on machine threads, cams and springs and the like. There's a bed of little hooked needles and a thread carrier that moves over them laying a row of thread.the needles retract, pulling the thread through the loops of the last row. When it pulls through, it it allows the last row to drop and creates a row of new loops, the needles push forward, the thread passes over them again, they then move back again creating the next set of loops.
I can probably get mum to take a video or two of them working if you're interested.
RevRico wrote: I got a better question we don't know. How are there over 500 channels available and absolutely nothing to watch?
That I think is a more existential question, but I'll bite. One could argue that there is only so much creation talent to go around and spreading two or three channels' worth of talent to 500 channels' worth means there is lttle concentration of goodness on any given channel. But that is a zero-sum approach and assumes that two-three channels were enough to fully allocate human creativity.
My observation is that there is an overburden of choice. The amount of time you have to watch TV is fixed. Therefore when you choose what to watch, you are really eliminating what you don't want to watch. When you have only two or three channels, you can easily judge what you don't want to see, and therefore find what you do want to watch. If you have five hundred choices, suddenly you have to find 499 things you don't want to watch. You can become VERY picky about your viewing standards. Actually, you MUST become pickier, otherwise you would go mad trying to find enough time in the day to watch, say, 12 different channels' worth of programming.
It's not that the programming is getting worse, it's that the viewer is getting pickier.
What is the purpose of these two fasteners on an MGB? 1/4" bolt with elaborate washering to plug a 1/2" hole on the slopping face of the toe-board. Attaches nothing to the car.
In reply to NOHOME:
My guess is it held something together during assembly, that serves no other purpose.
Similarly, we've got a machine at work with some threaded holes in the base, that serve no purpose but to tie it down, during transport.
vwcorvette wrote:Slippery wrote: Why did the chicken cross the road?To prove to the squirrel it could be done.
A: These are fossilized dinosaur eggs, no chickens were around at that time.
EvanR wrote: Ever used a BNC connector? (Primarily for composite video, sometimes antennas). Do any of you fine folk know what BNC stands for?
British national communications?
Why isn't it more well known that Johnny O'Connell tried to murder Dario Franchitti?
In reply to Knurled:
Very well stated! Spot on accurate as well.
In reply to NOHOME:
Is it there for draining something? Like they chemical dip the whole chassis during manufacturing and then after the fluid all drains out they replace the plug?
Maybe the design didn't originally call for a drain there but they found out after they started doing it that they also needed one there.
Robbie wrote: In reply to NOHOME: Is it there for draining something? Like they chemical dip the whole chassis during manufacturing and then after the fluid all drains out they replace the plug?
You mean like a saltwater bath to pre-rust the steel before paint?
I've seen MGs, I don't think they used any kind of ANTIcorrosive bath... 
Robbie wrote:EvanR wrote: Ever used a BNC connector? (Primarily for composite video, sometimes antennas). Do any of you fine folk know what BNC stands for?British national communications?
B= bayonett. The N and the C are the first letters of two dudes names, but I don't know them without googling.
Lots of holes in body panels soley for fixturing in production and drain holes are a possibility.
There is a hole in the fender under the F-series emblem on 20+ years of trucks for fixturing only.
codrus wrote:RevRico wrote: How do you make RAM? Like, how did the concept, and then hardware combination, evolve to become RAM? BUILDING A computer from parts is easy, building parts for a computer is magic.Nah, RAM is actually pretty simple. As with most things in computing, it seems really complicated but it's really built out of a zillion little tiny simple things. You start with a transistor, a voltage controlled switch. You can put 3 or 4 transistors together to make a logic gate (AND, OR, etc), then you can use 3 or 4 of those logic gates to build something called a "flip-flop". A flip-flop is one bit of memory, you can store a value of 0 or 1 in it and then read it back later. Add 7 flip-flops next to it and now you've got a byte of memory. Replicate that assembly another 1023 times and you've got a 1K SRAM (static RAM) chip. (DRAM is a bit different, it involves capacitors and has a bunch of compromises in order to get the size and the cost down).
I've seen magnetic matrix memory on display at a few NASA museums. That looks like a potential DIY computer project.
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