Who is your favourite electronics guru?

Cryptic - John Larkin, John Poplish. John Woodgate (rarely present in guru mode)?

John Jardine might be a candidate, but if he is a guru it isn't in an area I know much about.

John Fields might be a guru to the 555 users' community - a very low-rent district.

My vote goes to Win Hill - he knows what he is doing and and can spell out why he does things the way he does.

Ohm (V = IZ). Kirkhoff. ( sigma 'current' = zero) R.I.P. And the ever present Mr. Murphy.

From lifetime experience in electronics.

Having fun

Stanislaw Slack user from Ulladulla.

-- Many thanks,

Don Lancaster voice phone: (928)428-4073 Synergetics 3860 West First Street Box 809 Thatcher, AZ 85552 rss:

Please visit my GURU's LAIR web site at

The one that used to work at Burr Brown and then went on to Microchip and today is .. ? That one?

Jon

Hello Stanislaw,

It's Gustav Kirchhoff. What amazes me is that he came up with his law at age 21, well before he got his degree. Well, maybe because his father was a lawyer ;-)

I like Bob Pease. Writes great articles, and he looks the part with that grey beard :->

Dave :)

"Jim Thompson" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Barrie Gilbert. Though there are a lot of other people not mentioned as well.

Robert

Thanks for the "errata", it is few decades since I learned his law and was using it since in "difficult" faults on many systems. Works!

Stanislaw Slack user from Ulladulla.

Most of my ccts have tricks stolen from Widlar. It would be interesting to see who's ideas have been reproduced the most.

Wish I had met Widlar. From the stories he sounds like someone I would have liked. Near miss by a couple of blocks and a couple of years.

Probably a very hard thing to judge and hard to categorize vs. realms -- analog, RF, digital, etc. But, yes, an interesting idea.

True- but guru has that "spirituality" nonsense associated with it, and that has nothing to do with engineering, the application of science, with science historically being the arch rival of religion. So I don't like the mix. You can find a bunch of self-styled gurus at

Most of the Laws, like Kirchoff's and Ohm's, are statements of the obvious.

Being easy to understand makes novices think themselves clever if they are memorised.

But experienced design engineers soon forget the recitation and never have to use them - and have to remind themselves by tediously thumbing through books when explaining how things work to novices. ===================================

The most interesting circuits have been posted by Bansuri, Bartoli, Hill, and Williams, there is no question about that and it's not open for debate. Thompson's circuits have been shockingly prosaic, maybe I'm missing something, but they're not in the same league insofar as anything actually submitted to SED. Your posts are of very good quality, but they're all words, so unless you learn how to draw a damned ascii schematic, you're not in the running- same goes for Ken Smith.

In message , dated Tue, 8 Aug 2006, Fred Bloggs writes

But it isn't, of course; the historical view is simply wrong. Science finds no need to postulate a Supreme Being, but that is ALL. It does not DENY the possibility, but the discussion of it existence is OUTSIDE science.

Is a guru better than a maven? And where is a boffin in the hierarchy? I suppose the lowest grade is 'geek'.

In message , dated Tue, 8 Aug 2006, Reg Edwards writes

Mysterious - something to learn next week

Incomprehensible - something to learn today

Enlightening - something learned today

Obvious - something learned yesterday

What? - something learned 5 years ago

Wrong - something learned more than 5 years ago

In message , dated Tue, 8 Aug 2006, Fred Bloggs writes

Add your murals to the list.

I need to qualify the above ranking as based upon submissions of ASCII schematics of active electronic circuits employing formal circuit theoretical techniques with reasonable justification. This is not an overall ranking of SED post submissions, there are quite a few usefully knowledgeable people who post purely in text, and they are not considered. SED should be about *circuits*- and this is the most important element of any ranking.

I favor "wiz"- sounds more apt with a recreational flavor to it. From thefreedictionary, wiz Pronunciation (wz) n. Informal A person considered exceptionally gifted or skilled.

My vote for Sir Oliver Heaviside.

Impressive work by someone who left school at 16, worked as a telegraph operator, and researched in isolation at his parents' house!