I'm not a hardware guy so I didn't really know what to expect from an article about "microchips that shook the world". The title seemed somewhat hyperbolic. I c

I'm not a hardware guy so I didn't really know what to expect from an article about "microchips that shook the world". The title seemed somewhat hyperbolic. I clicked on it to see if there was any mention of the 555, one of the few "chips" I know about. Some 20 years ago my sister's boyfriend and I made a simple "autofire" for my Amiga. I guess it was some kind of bonding thing. An autofire was a piece of hardware that you would hook up between a joystick and the computer. I didn't know much about electronics so he put together the schematics. It involved a 555 and a potentiometer so that the fire rate could be controlled. I was good enough with a soldering iron that he let me assemble the thing. Fun times. (Turns out that the article had a few more chips I recognized.)