3 ms·

I know how to program. But how can one learn to design circuits just like one writes a program? Sounds totally black magic to me. Any starting points?

by wg0 3y ago

analog31 3y ago
A decade or two ago, I would have recommended The Art of Electronics by Horowitz and Hill. I learned from that textbook, plus a lot of home experimentation, and application notes from the IC manufacturers notably National Semiconductor. Those app notes are still available online from Texas Instruments, and still relevant. Today, I help colleagues get started in electronics. They often have some sort of science or non-EE engineering background. I recommend diving into the Arduino universe, perhaps by looking through the many tutorials at the Adafruit webiste. (And buying her stuff). Learn, the way a lot of us old-timers learned to code: Take some working program, duplicate it, and make minor changes, and see what happens. Even if your ultimate interest is analog rather than digital, the tools that you learn to make in the digital realm, such as measurement, will help you test your beginning analog circuits. On the other hand, if you're interested in analog, you may have a reason, such as audio or music electronics, in which case, there are a lot of documented projects out there to build and learn from. Don't work with anything potentially dangerous at first, if ever. Things that can release a large amount of energy (voltage, current, mechanical, heat) if your code has a bug are worth leaving to the real engineers.
- mmac_ 3y ago
  This is solid advice. Find something you're interested in and go from there. If you can't find anything, maybe build something like a weather station. You'll start with a simple task: read the ambient temperature and display it somewhere (on an LCD, in a react app on the cloud etc). You'll then need to start solving problems, like how do you read outside temperature where you'll learn about batteries, wireless technology, water proofing etc. Don't stress about the electronics and certainly don't be intimidated by text books. When you're starting out you don't need to really know the theory of transistors, but maybe a few youtube videos on the basics won't go astray. Think about if you were learning to code... would you read a book and start stressing about computer architecture? Some people might, but most won't. They'll hit up create-react-app and mess around with that. When you're learning it's important to get instant feedback. Just learn how to blink an LED and you've completed the hello-world of electronics. If you can code, you can do electronics. Same for the reverse. The skill sets are closely aligned.

I know how to program. But how can one learn to design circuits just like one writes a program? Sounds totally black magic to me. Any starting points?

by wg0 3y ago

I know how to program. But how can one learn to design circuits just like one writes a program? Sounds totally black magic to me. Any starting points?

analog31 3y ago

A decade or two ago, I would have recommended The Art of Electronics by Horowitz and Hill. I learned from that textbook, plus a lot of home experimentation, and application notes from the IC manufacturers notably National Semiconductor. Those app notes are still available online from Texas Instruments, and still relevant. Today, I help colleagues get started in electronics. They often have some sort of science or non-EE engineering background. I recommend diving into the Arduino universe, perhaps by looking through the many tutorials at the Adafruit webiste. (And buying her stuff). Learn, the way a lot of us old-timers learned to code: Take some working program, duplicate it, and make minor changes, and see what happens. Even if your ultimate interest is analog rather than digital, the tools that you learn to make in the digital realm, such as measurement, will help you test your beginning analog circuits. On the other hand, if you're interested in analog, you may have a reason, such as audio or music electronics, in which case, there are a lot of documented projects out there to build and learn from. Don't work with anything potentially dangerous at first, if ever. Things that can release a large amount of energy (voltage, current, mechanical, heat) if your code has a bug are worth leaving to the real engineers.

mmac_ 3y ago
This is solid advice. Find something you're interested in and go from there. If you can't find anything, maybe build something like a weather station. You'll start with a simple task: read the ambient temperature and display it somewhere (on an LCD, in a react app on the cloud etc). You'll then need to start solving problems, like how do you read outside temperature where you'll learn about batteries, wireless technology, water proofing etc. Don't stress about the electronics and certainly don't be intimidated by text books. When you're starting out you don't need to really know the theory of transistors, but maybe a few youtube videos on the basics won't go astray. Think about if you were learning to code... would you read a book and start stressing about computer architecture? Some people might, but most won't. They'll hit up create-react-app and mess around with that. When you're learning it's important to get instant feedback. Just learn how to blink an LED and you've completed the hello-world of electronics. If you can code, you can do electronics. Same for the reverse. The skill sets are closely aligned.