7 ms·

"On board quality - I paid a High School/College kid in Sri Lanka to do the board; I will give him your feedback." the most beautiful thing i'll read today.

faitswulff 8y ago
At once very cool and potentially very sad to me. Sad to think that skilled engineers are being underpaid because they lost the geographic birthplace lottery.
- Drdrdrq 8y ago
  On the other hand relatively low amount of money makes this person wealthy. It's not just absolute amount that matters, it's where you spend it too. (saying as someone who is not from US, and wouldn't trade)
  - tracker1 8y ago
    That was my first thought as well... I've worked with a handful of extremely skilled developers/engineers over the years in China, Russia and India that would be impossible to pay for at U.S. prices, but able to offer very competitive money for where they are located. On the flip side, I've also had more very bad experiences with outsourcing overseas and communication barriers. Cultural differences are often underestimated, and without dedicated oversight/management things can go off the rails pretty badly. It really depends on a lot of variables. I have mixed feelings about globalization myself, living in a higher paying country for the work I do. But I don't fault anyone for offering or taking a good wage for one's circumstances. I just wish it worked a bit better for the consumer in some protective markets (medications mostly, but others too).
  - zerr 8y ago
    No, it's a quality of life that matters.
- mlevental 8y ago
  either they're getting underpaid or you're getting overpaid. pick one.
  - nmca 8y ago
    Relevant concept is called "Purchasing Power Parity"
- jjeaff 8y ago
  I pay some overseas developers way below the median faang salary, and yet, their quality of life is likely much better than your average faang employee due to the much lower cost of living. In other words, they aren't making six figures and yet still sharing a 2 bedroom apartment with 6 other developers.
  - komali2 8y ago
    This was my grand scheme all along - after having a comically high quality of life on 2k/month in Taipei as an English teacher, I moved back to the states to learn frontend. Now I'm building out my resume and network so I can eventually fuck off back to Taipei, work a couple contract roles, pull in a cool ~4kish a month, and live like a king while having far more time for my own projects. It was inspired when me and my dirty, sweaty, budget beer-drinking buddies were hanging out at a 7/11 with a foreign engineer we had just met. He said he wanted to go to the club, we were like "dude cover is pretty expensive, let's just drink our 50 cent beers." He did a quick count of us, then said "ok, I'll pay for everyone's cover." Rent was 250USD a month, 100mbps internet 20 USD... this on top of the fact that you're getting nearly equal healthcare because all the doctors are US school trained anyway, way better public transit (trains are automated! and CLEAN!!). I mean, it's the dream.
    - croshan 8y ago
      Wow. What are the downsides?
      - toomanybeersies 8y ago
        Language and culture barriers can be pretty big downsides to moving countries.
        DyslexicAtheist 8y ago
        overcoming them is the whole point of traveling
      - 8y ago
- gumby 8y ago
  > Sad to think that skilled engineers are being underpaid because they lost the geographic birthplace lottery. How do you know they were underpaid? It's cheaper for me to have boards made in Colorado than in Santa Clara, and I'm certain the Colorado workers are paid less (the parts come from Digit-Key either way). Would you consider your statement true in that case too? They amount paid (whatever it was) might have been enough for a nice lifestyle in Sri Lanka -- perhaps more so than the Colorado case.
- paulie_a 8y ago
  I've worked with some overseas developers that were terrific and terrible. Typically the good ones wanted to stay put.
- true_tuna 8y ago
  High school kids everywhere appreciate the chance to make money doing interesting work. This kid will continue building skills and will join the modern economy. I’m more worried about all his peers who ARE NOT doing this.
q3k 8y ago
The terrible routing of the board does actually impact the device though - the decoupling and power distribution is so messed up that PLLs do not lock on it [1]. Also the lack of a proper external clock means you have to rely on the +/- 10% internal 48MHz oscillator. [1] - https://twitter.com/oe1cxw/status/950083493073178625?lang=en https://twitter.com/oe1cxw/status/950083493073178625?lang=en
- xfer 8y ago
  The next revision board (v2 costs $16) has a FTDI chip and you can use its oscillator(12MHz).
exikyut 8y ago
And on component sourcing, reading from further down the thread (https://www.element14.com/community/groups/fpga-group/blog/2017/09/30/gnarly-grey-upduino#comment-115691 https://www.element14.com/community/groups/fpga-group/blog/2...)... actually I won't spoil it, go find out where the flash chips came from yourself. (Or... perhaps they weren't refurbished/reused, and we just discovered one manufacturer's test image?!)

faitswulff 8y ago

At once very cool and potentially very sad to me. Sad to think that skilled engineers are being underpaid because they lost the geographic birthplace lottery.

Drdrdrq 8y ago
On the other hand relatively low amount of money makes this person wealthy. It's not just absolute amount that matters, it's where you spend it too. (saying as someone who is not from US, and wouldn't trade)
- tracker1 8y ago
  That was my first thought as well... I've worked with a handful of extremely skilled developers/engineers over the years in China, Russia and India that would be impossible to pay for at U.S. prices, but able to offer very competitive money for where they are located. On the flip side, I've also had more very bad experiences with outsourcing overseas and communication barriers. Cultural differences are often underestimated, and without dedicated oversight/management things can go off the rails pretty badly. It really depends on a lot of variables. I have mixed feelings about globalization myself, living in a higher paying country for the work I do. But I don't fault anyone for offering or taking a good wage for one's circumstances. I just wish it worked a bit better for the consumer in some protective markets (medications mostly, but others too).
- zerr 8y ago
  No, it's a quality of life that matters.
mlevental 8y ago
either they're getting underpaid or you're getting overpaid. pick one.
- nmca 8y ago
  Relevant concept is called "Purchasing Power Parity"
jjeaff 8y ago
I pay some overseas developers way below the median faang salary, and yet, their quality of life is likely much better than your average faang employee due to the much lower cost of living. In other words, they aren't making six figures and yet still sharing a 2 bedroom apartment with 6 other developers.
- komali2 8y ago
  This was my grand scheme all along - after having a comically high quality of life on 2k/month in Taipei as an English teacher, I moved back to the states to learn frontend. Now I'm building out my resume and network so I can eventually fuck off back to Taipei, work a couple contract roles, pull in a cool ~4kish a month, and live like a king while having far more time for my own projects. It was inspired when me and my dirty, sweaty, budget beer-drinking buddies were hanging out at a 7/11 with a foreign engineer we had just met. He said he wanted to go to the club, we were like "dude cover is pretty expensive, let's just drink our 50 cent beers." He did a quick count of us, then said "ok, I'll pay for everyone's cover." Rent was 250USD a month, 100mbps internet 20 USD... this on top of the fact that you're getting nearly equal healthcare because all the doctors are US school trained anyway, way better public transit (trains are automated! and CLEAN!!). I mean, it's the dream.
  - croshan 8y ago
    Wow. What are the downsides?
    - toomanybeersies 8y ago
      Language and culture barriers can be pretty big downsides to moving countries.
      - DyslexicAtheist 8y ago
        overcoming them is the whole point of traveling
    - 8y ago
gumby 8y ago
> Sad to think that skilled engineers are being underpaid because they lost the geographic birthplace lottery. How do you know they were underpaid? It's cheaper for me to have boards made in Colorado than in Santa Clara, and I'm certain the Colorado workers are paid less (the parts come from Digit-Key either way). Would you consider your statement true in that case too? They amount paid (whatever it was) might have been enough for a nice lifestyle in Sri Lanka -- perhaps more so than the Colorado case.
paulie_a 8y ago
I've worked with some overseas developers that were terrific and terrible. Typically the good ones wanted to stay put.
true_tuna 8y ago
High school kids everywhere appreciate the chance to make money doing interesting work. This kid will continue building skills and will join the modern economy. I’m more worried about all his peers who ARE NOT doing this.

q3k 8y ago

The terrible routing of the board does actually impact the device though - the decoupling and power distribution is so messed up that PLLs do not lock on it [1]. Also the lack of a proper external clock means you have to rely on the +/- 10% internal 48MHz oscillator. [1] - https://twitter.com/oe1cxw/status/950083493073178625?lang=en https://twitter.com/oe1cxw/status/950083493073178625?lang=en

xfer 8y ago
The next revision board (v2 costs $16) has a FTDI chip and you can use its oscillator(12MHz).

exikyut 8y ago

And on component sourcing, reading from further down the thread (https://www.element14.com/community/groups/fpga-group/blog/2017/09/30/gnarly-grey-upduino#comment-115691 https://www.element14.com/community/groups/fpga-group/blog/2...)... actually I won't spoil it, go find out where the flash chips came from yourself. (Or... perhaps they weren't refurbished/reused, and we just discovered one manufacturer's test image?!)