Lectures/Lesson

[Zak Smolen]

Hi everyone,

I have had the idea recently to do some more academic/educational lectures. Some would probably be one session and could probably fall under the post-meeting demo category while others would involve more than one session and we would have to schedule a time that works (pre-meeting, post-meeting, different day). Here are some of the topics I have come up with so far:

Single sessions:
- How to use an oscilloscope
- In general, how to debug a circuit
- Different types of motors, applications, how to control them, etc.

- LED applications, how they work, how to drive them correctly

- In depth about other electrical components and devices (capacitor, transistors/semiconductors, etc.)

- How the internet works, look at different network protocols (could also be multiple sessions and more depth)

Multiple sessions:
- How a computer works. Look at what the different parts of a CPU is and how they work
- Intro to programming (probably using python)
- Intro to the power grid and high-voltage power generation/distribution

- Discrete logic and applications

I'm not looking to start a university here, though many of these would basically be me boiling down a college course into the most important and interesting bits, but a lot of these topics can be really cool. These are the things I came up with that I would be comfortable teaching. We have a bunch of trained EE/CS/CPE/ME members who could probably also talk to many of these topics, as well as their own specialties.

Basically,
1. Is there interest in some more academic demos/sessions?
2. What sorts of things would people be interested in, either from my list or other topics you want to know about?

Thanks,

Zak

[Avi Silverman]

I'm interested, and could put together a list of classes I could potentially teach (I think I actually have a list somewhere from a couple years ago). My only concerns are small turnout and teacher burnout. Personally, I would love some ME related topics, since that's my weak area. Can someone pretty please teach a class called "common sense fabrication: how to make things from stuff"?

This is just a thought, but perhaps for some of the more involved topics (not just quick demo / chat after the meeting) a few could could be paired with an outreach effort to draw additional outside people in. Not sure how much interest there is to the general public on these more technical types of topics, but maybe we can figure out a couple of classes to offer that would also be interesting / helpful to "normal" people?

Anyway, I'm pretty busy for the next couple months, but I'd definitely be willing to do some more detailed workshops starting September.

Avi

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[Zak Smolen]

Yeh sure thing. I think half of my ideas would fall under "in depth technical things" and the other half would be "how things we use every day actually work". The latter would probably be more successful, but I figured I'd compile a list of whatever I could think of that I felt qualified teaching.

The one thing that would worry me about outreach for teaching is how _official_ that would make things. I am by no means a qualified professor, I just was a pretty good student and still have many of my textbooks and notes and presentation material. The more official we make things, the more pressure on everyone, teachers and students.

We had talked long ago about some sort of roster that could include skills/specialties. We could do a similar idea here, and compile a list of teachable topics so that we can gauge interest in things and react appropriately.

First things first I know there was definitely interest in both how to use an oscilloscope, and more generally how to debug circuits with issues. I have some ideas for those and will probably put them together as post-meeting demo lessons.

[Michael Crose]

Dude I'd be down for a few of those. Always been kinda in the dark about oscilloscopes.

[Steve Altemeier]

Love this idea and would definitely be interested in taking a class on oscilloscopes - thanks!

On Tue, Jul 18, 2017 at 5:55 PM, Michael Crose <crose....@gmail.com> wrote:

Dude I'd be down for a few of those. Always been kinda in the dark about oscilloscopes.

[Ian Baillie]

 Along those lines, is there any interest in doing a Linux setup/useage class? I am finding a renewed interest in some things that I haven't done in many years, and messing about with Linux is one of them. I am probably going to see if I have an old laptop in my graveyard that I can get up and going with one version or another (leaning toward Ubuntu for some applications that I want to mess with).

[Will Eccleston]

I just realized I'd missed the first part of this discussion.  There are probably lots of things here that I'd be interested in, but if someone were to teach Avi's suggestion "common sense fabrication: how to make things from stuff"?...I'd definitely make time to learn about that.  Would love to learn Fusion, which I find relatively cryptic.  And if there were a way to learn how to take an idea through Fusion all the way to having an injection mold created (even if we can't actually afford an injection mold, they're expensive) that would be great.  Basically, how does a little guy take an idea to the stage of having 500,000 of them manufactured at a high standard, without wasting a lot of time and money or getting totally ripped off in the process. 

I have been very busy with work, which is why I've disappeared, but I shall return soon!

[Bob Sinclair]

Like Will I have been a little busy of late and am just seeing this thread now. Also hoping life may quieten down a little as fall approaches. And as long as things don't get too theoretical I'm interested in learning more about all this stuff. Happy to teach a little as well if people's interests run to silversmithing or biotech...

On Thursday, July 13, 2017 at 1:53:53 PM UTC-4, Zak Smolen wrote: