Short message

I read in sci.electronics.design that snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org wrote (in ) about 'Short message', on Sun, 20 Mar 2005:

Some will agree with you. (;-)

Presumably you can't conveniently try another country?

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only. 
There are two sides to every question, except 
'What is a Moebius strip?'
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk

"qualifications" ???? Bwahahahahaha!

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

--
Why not try setting up a consultancy?

Seriously, Bill, with your qualifications and the age bias that seems
to be in place there, ISTM that might be one way to get out of the
doldrums, no?

It didn't generate any significant amount of business the last time I tried it. I could, in theory spend a lot on design tools and advertising, but I've not be able to come up with any kind of business plan that strikes me as plausible.

----------- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

"John Woodgate" wrote

I sure agree! 'bout the only thing I do agree with Bill on.

It would have to be a country with a more generous welfare payment. There aren't many of those, and they're full!

More generous than the one you're receiving now?

I'm sure that is one subject you /do/ know something about.

Since I'm looking for work, not welfare, the level of welfare payments doesn't come into it.

------------- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Personal recommendation - a.k.a. "networking" - is by far the best way of getting any kind of work.

That was spelled out in "What Colour is your Parachute" - I've had a copy since 1991 - and was recently re-emphasised by a"four day "reintegration" course that I had to follow to maintain my unemployment benefit.

I managed to do a fair bit of networking around Cambridge, when I was there - there is a lot of electronics going on around Cambridge, some of it very long established - but I've drawn a blank in Nijmegen, which doesn't have much in the way of local high tech. Philips Semiconductors does have a big factory here, and I play hockey with one of the senior research guys, but Philips takes every opportunity to fire anybody over

55, and their personnel department blocks even short term hires of people over that age.

The computer science course might provide some kind of route into the local high tech economy - not a particularly promisng path, but better than anything else I can come up with.

------------ Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

I read in sci.electronics.design that snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org wrote (in ) about 'Short message', on Sun, 20 Mar 2005:

Advertising a consultancy doesn't work, in my experience. And all business plans are implausible. Luckily, when I started, I didn't need to borrow, so I didn't need a business plan, which would have been totally telephone numbers.

What does work is personal recommendation, which means that the most useful asset is a large circle of acquaintances in the electronics business. You may get that from experience in sales or membership of technical societies, or even standards committees. If you haven't got any of those, it is likely to be pretty difficult to get started, I would think.

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only. 
There are two sides to every question, except 
'What is a Moebius strip?'
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk

Dead-on correct!

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

I'm really quite cavalier, drives my wife nuts... but my policy is simply: happy=positive-cash-flow, unhappy=negative-cash-flow ;-)

I don't think Sloman could handle being a consultant... he seems to think he knows everything, and that often does not go down well with the customer.

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

When the customer does not have answers themselves, they look at your demonstrated ability to grasp and solve a problem, even though it's new to your arena.

I prefer tackling new stuff of which I have not an initial clue ;-)

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

But Woodgate has us left with two last lines bereft.

;)

--
John Fields

--
Yes.  I didn't want to mess with your lines, but what I had in mind
was:

George the Third
Ought never have occurred,
But Woodgate has us left
with two last lines bereft.

>The other lines are 'One can only wonder/At so 
>grotesque a blunder'.

["Followup-To:" header set to sci.electronics.design.] On 19 Mar 2005 02:07:45 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org wrote in Msg.

C'mon, Bill, give John a break for once. He wrote a limerick about you. And although it was designed primarily as a vehicle for not entirely unsubstantiated criticism (see the quotation above), and although it doesn't rhyme very well, it's a poem nevertheless, which is a token of some sort of affection or respect, don't you think?

About the start-your-own-business tips: I have come to the conclusion that this is entirely a matter of personality, not age or competence. I never could do it. I did quite a bit of freelancing work for people that got to know me somehow, but always with a steady day job in the background. I'd go nuts if I had to do that sort of stuff full-time. The freelancers I know claim to go nuts if they were employed -- go figure.

--Daniel

I read in sci.electronics.design that Daniel Haude wrote (in ) about 'Short message', on Mon, 21 Mar 2005:

Bill should be a lot more worried if it was a sonnet instead of a limerick. But the best literary put-down is a clerihew. For example:

George the Third Ought never to have occurred.

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only.
There are two sides to every question, except
'What is a Moebius strip?'
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk

I read in sci.electronics.design that Jim Thompson wrote (in ) about 'Short message', on Mon, 21 Mar 2005:

It often does to be gin with, in fact, the most dangerous clients are those who assume you know everything, so they don't tell you stuff like, 'Oh, BTW, we're shipping it to Singapore. It will meet their EMC and safety requirements, won't it?'.

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only.
There are two sides to every question, except
'What is a Moebius strip?'
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk

On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 09:28:51 -0700, Jim Thompson wrote in Msg.

Fair enough. I think the same way.

I think he can distinguish fairly accurately between what he does know and doesn't know, and is not afraid to show it. His willingness to enter into political dispute is what might offend a customer with a weak personality.

I just had a job interview at a well-known company in which I mostly talked about my lack of background in areas required by the job, but still seem to have left a positive impression -- let's see.

--D.

On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 11:15:40 -0700, Jim Thompson wrote in Msg.

I do, too. I once took on a (for me) major C++ programming job just to learn the language. Actually the customer hadn't specified any language; I told them that C++ was exactly the right tool for the job -- which was pretty much all I knew about it, and I was right. I admit that I didn't tell them that I didn't know the language, but I have a pretty accurate view of how long it will take me to learn something. To my surprise it turned out that I beat every single deadline of the customer by about a week or two, but I didn't turn over my work until only one day before deadline. That kept them impressed without making them piling on too much more work, and it gave me some spare time to work on my PhD.

--D.