Can an electronics student join?

Sure, there aren't any rules, no moderator.

What are you interested in?

Post a problem or a circuit or whatever. Ignore any people that you don't like.

No need to join. There is no formal membership in Usenet, no initiation rituals, hazing, or any of that.

But ... for more basic questions there is sci.electronics.basics and also people really do not like it when students try to get their homework solved here. However, if you've made a serious effort and can't figure something out or if you get stuck with a hardware project, by all means ask.

And build stuff. It's super important for a career in electronics. Companies want people who can make things happen. Nothing beats a well-working prototype and good presentable documentation.

Just send the $40 registration fee to John Larkin.

To clarify: Questions where you obviously just typed in a homework problem from the book will piss us off. Questions that go something like "I'm doing this homework problem and I can't figure out what XXX means", or "I'm in a Circuits & Systems class and I just can't figure out what this 's' thing is" will get you help.

Questions like "I'm taking E&M and I can't get my head wrapped around the curl operator" will _definitely_ get you lots of sympathy, but I'm not sure how many of us will be able to jump in and help you, at least not without hitting the books ourselves.

No hazing? Really? ;-)

Please be honest about it.

You bet! I was working with one of the young engineers today. While he's certainly a bright kid, he has just about zero real experience. He's been pretty much thrown into the deep end of the EMI swimming pool without a lifeguard. The first thing I had to do was help him sort out what he was really looking at and what he wanted to look at. Any hardware experience you can get in college will set you apart from the crowd.

Tomorrow I'll have to buy myself a life vest. But not for EMI, it's for whitewater. Too many people have died on that river.

I've interviewed many engineers. Among the freshly minted ones the absolute best impression was when people dumped a bunch of circuit boards on the table and explained what each does, and how. One client's VP of Engineering saw me coming out of an interview after just 15 minutes or so. She wanted to know why I broke it off. "Oh no, this it _the_ guy, do not even let him get back to his car without an offer letter in his hand". That was probably around five years ago, he got hired and is still there.

When I showed up for my first interviews I brought a thick binder with all my project documentation and photos in there. Couldn't bring much gear because it was way too big and heavy. Folks at the university said that would be ridiculous and hiring managers wouldn't take me serious. Little did they know. It's too long ago but I believe out of six interviews I got six offers. A few months later I gave one of the hiring managers who interviewed me a ride home because his car had a problem. "Hey, George, can we go by your house? I want to see that monster amp you talked about back in summer."

I'll join you up for $35.00 ;-)

Also prepare for lots of spam now that you used a real (apparently) email address on your post. These groups are trawled by bots for email addys...

Chris.

My manager hired a newly minted grad for some DSP work this summer. The kid is *good* (*really* good) and lives locally (about three miles from our building). Unfortunately, he's off to grad school (UIUC ;-) in a few weeks.

I'll do it for $50.00. Accept no substitute for quality enginnering. ;)

Tim

But for that we'll expect some serious redneck rants :-)

It's actually not that bad anymore. Best is to mung the "from" email address and put a valid one (but not your primary email address) in the "reply to" field. That's how my news provider suggested it and how I did it. Spam isn't bad.

I'm not sure 100% offer rate is much of an indicator. But I guess it does indicate that you get the offers which means you can cull the employers.

I used to get 100% offer rate. The headhunters always wanted me to either accept or turn down an offer quickly without more interviews, but I wanted to see what else was out there. But now that I am over 50... well over 50 it is actually hard to get an interview much less an offer. Age discrimination is real... very real. Fortunately I am not in need of a job.

you may notice my email address, somehow google doesn't let/put much spam to this address, ...yet.

Huh?

When I graduated I would have had a 100% rate, except I told one HR moron what a piss poor outfit he was running (in front of 30-40 other candidates - I was pissed at them for the treatment).

It's real enough but it also goes both ways. My boss would be very reluctant to hire someone much under 50. Of the five engineers, the youngest is 48 and two are over 60. The mechanical guy he's trying to get is 65.

I get essentially no mail at the jlarkin address.

Google have always had a full-time team of people watching its spam filters, which also have a lot of built-in AI. I don't think there's a better spam filter available anywhere on the market.

This goddammed delusional narcissist again!

You say that like it's a bad thing. I am used to it. If you think people are bad here, try alt.revisionism.

Isn't there a newsgroup just for flaming?

This touches on a bit of interview strategy. The reason the interviewers like to see built stuff is because they have problems. They have to hire someone to solve those problems. If it's engineering, they need someone who can build something. So in general, I believe it's a very good strategy to find out exactly what the hiring manager needs, and present a solution to her. The more concrete the better. This seems so obvious, but you'd be surprised...