Definitive Handbook

Actually, modern spell-checkers conduct a more extensive analysis of the sentence structure, identifying parts of speech, etc.

"Dumb" spellcheckers just use a list of correctly spelled words and hope to find each of your words in that list. As a result, the larger the list, the WORSE the performance of the algorithm!

s.b. "Sought"

This quote originates from an internal engineering document and training manual for transistor modeling, not a traditionally published textbook. The guide offers practical, step-by-step procedures for extracting parameters and constructing SPICE computer simulation models for NPN Bipolar Junction Transistors (BJTs).

The exact author of this internal document is not named, as it was written anonymously and collectively by a group of "NEW-HIREs" (newly hired junior engineers) at an unnamed semiconductor or aerospace firm.

The Transistor Modeling Techniques Guide functions as an informal, internally passed-down "survival guide" rather than an official corporate publication or textbook. It was compiled by entry-level engineers who had just gone through the frustrating trial-and-error process of extracting Gummel-Poon BJT parameters and "tweaking" SPICE simulation files to match physical manufacturer data sheets.Because the guide was written from the perspective of junior employees who had to learn the hard way, they left tongue-in-cheek advice for the next generation of engineers onboarding into the device modeling department.

Not worth serious consideration.

Word 2024 wants to make the correct corrections to advise and your. It doesn't notice sort but if I change it to saught it wants to correct it to sought.

Mimir frowns on "a lot" (as too casual for the tone of the text) suggesting things like:

"It is anticipated that numerous inquiries will arise throughout the process."

And, I am surprised that the choice of conjunctive wasn't flagged. Or the capitalizations.

They weren't shooting for the Nobel.

They got the thankless job that senior engineers preferred to avoid for one reason or another - those senior engineers tending to chuck PCs out the window, if they had sufficient seniority.

. . . . and they didn't have access to the typing pool or a secretary.

It's a practical example of bipolar device spice modeling that is well worth the read, typos and all.

RL

Writing is hard. Especially if you have to ANTICIPATE your audience.

The first technical document that I authored (~600pp) saw a lot of upfront work in figuring out how to present the material in a way that someone new to the device could absorb as well as someone who had been using it for years and needed it just as a "reference" for some seldom used feature/detail.

Read man pages to see just how piss poor engineers are at organizing material for someone ELSE to understand!

In my experience the average writing skills of new EEs have gone downhill, fast. There are exceptions but many can't even compose a decent module spec.

Regarding what the authors above were saying: A few months after I had earned my degree I met a university mate by chance, at a big rail station. He got his degree around the same time, also a few months before. However, this guy did not have a lick of practical experience with electronics. No hobby exposure, no tinkering, no repairing of electronics, nothing, only whatever theory he had learned at the university. I asked him what he did at this first job. "Writing application notes for [huge semiconductor company]" ... WHAT?!

Makes sense. It's obvious that most appnotes and data sheets are done by people who don't rate parking spots.

There is apparently a plan to defund schools where a majority of grads don't make minimum wage, $36K a year.

As an Australian-born and educated engineer, the suggestion that Australian or New Zealand trained engineer would have trouble separating sort and sought strikes me as unrealistic.

The only engineer I know who had that kind of problem was English and dyslexic. We couldn't persuade him that works that sounded the same could need to be spelled differently, depending on the different ideas that they were expressing. About 15% of readers do sub-vocalise - as you can test by printing a piece of verse as if it were prose and asking the reader if it was rythmic (and my wife and one of her colleagues did the experiment and published the result in verse, printed as it were prose), but most understand that "theirs" and "there's" are different concepts.

Appalachian?

RL