Stupid problems requiring stupid ideas - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Raj
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 05:53:07 am
content: I wanna hear some. (Problems that are so stupid, that they are not worth your time to solve, but the solution is stupidly obvious too)I'll start with one.So, Apple wanted to make a charging pad into which you plop on your phone and it starts to charge, regardless of the position of is in. They started messing with multiple coils and what notJust make the pad a bit thicker and insert an xy gantry that repositions the coil underneath the phone...: Job doneA 2d tredmil on top that repositions the phone will work too.. Or a combination, like tredmil for x axis and internal mechanism for y axis

author: engrguy42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 11:35:19 am
content: Y'know, in some ways I feel kinda sorry for the engineers and marketers working on consumer electronics stuff.Like Apple...hell, every year they need to figure out some cool new feature for their smartphones that somehow they can convince people they need, and moreover that consumers are willing to pay freakin' thousands of $$$ for. Must be tough. Okay, now you need big smartphones. Okay, they have big, let's make small phones the new thing...Kinda like the big screen TV nonsense. Okay, now we have 4k (which people can't even see the resolution difference, even though they'll never admit it...). And next they need to come up with something new? Like 8K? Are you freakin' serious?And all this Alexa/AI crap so people can sit on their butts all day and not have to get up out of their sofas?And self driving cars? Seriously?

author: Rerouter
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 11:56:54 am
content: Vehicle needed to be speed limited, but customer did not want to pay for a proper system, there was already a warning light on the dash when they where speeding, so when that light comes on, a buzzer sounds and a timer relay starts, 5 seconds later the door position switch is interrupted by the timer, the bus thinks the door is open and the vehicle is moving, so the bus interlocks the throttle back to idle with a big solenoid, so very stupid, but the customer was happy.Next up, a bus comes out from a factory with the wrong calibration from the transmission, I had no way to make the system meet that calibration, the solution, reprogram the speedo to think its range was 335kmph instead of 120kmph, I still have no idea why they didn't just get the dealer to fix it, the odometer is counting up 3x faster than normalMahindra did not build in a way for there dealers to calibrate the dash to all the variety of tire sizes they can supply them in, solution? figure out what it should read with the largest possible tire size, and just set it accordingly, this means the default tire size has the speedo reading 100kmph when the vehicle is only doing about 77kmph via GPS

author: Raj
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 02:02:49 pm
content: Quote from: Rerouter on May 22, 2020, 11:56:54 amMahindra?As expected from Indian engineers. They do exactly what management needs...nothing less, nothing more.Quote from: engrguy42 on May 22, 2020, 11:35:19 amUnfortunately...I don't think, engineers have much say in apple.Otherwise the phone would have started to resemble a swiss army knife with various features. Take Ir blaster for eg. Samsung had it...(I used it a lot to control my TV and AC), Now they don't.(couldn't cram an 0402 led)With the amount of power apple has, they could have made the whole industry switch to 1.5mm or even 0.5mm headphone jack...but they didn't.What they do allow them to do is,malicious, like keep the cable in laptop display hinge, just short enough to break after a month of regular use

author: Syntax Error
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 02:23:32 pm
content: I'm minded to remember the Palm Pre, a mobile phone that was a decade too late. I should know, we were developing an app for the Pre, but only with the SDK, because there were problems with the release of physical handsets to the developer community. We had to travel to London just to touch one (sad). It's USP was the wireless charging hub, which is why the Pre had a chunky a**. For induction charging read induction hob. It died a death and went straight to silicon hell.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 03:29:08 pm
content: Quote from: Raj on May 22, 2020, 05:53:07 amMultiple coils in Qi-based charging pads is pretty common. I haven't followed Apple's story on their own, and whether it was really badly engineered or not. I don't use Apple products.But between a multi-coil approach, and an XY gantry to move either the coil or phone, I have a slight idea of which would be the most stupid...

author: cdev
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 05:45:17 pm
content: I think we've all been through something like this.

author: David Hess
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 08:21:14 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on May 22, 2020, 03:29:08 pmI looked into what details were available including the patents and prototype and I though Apple got scammed. I suspect their managers ignored what their engineers had to say.The idea appeared to be that multiple coils could be switched into the resonate charging circuit to shape the inductive field for best coupling and to support multiple devices. The inventors had a test system which demonstrated higher efficiency, but it was a small signal test! Under large signal conditions, the circulating currents are very high leading to a loss of efficiency with a practical implementation.

author: Wojciech Krolopp
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 09:43:51 pm
content: Quote from: Raj on May 22, 2020, 02:02:49 pm

author: schmitt trigger
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 22, 2020, 10:32:11 pm
content: Quote from: cdev on May 22, 2020, 05:45:17 pmOf course.And when one attempts to explain the ludicrousness of the concept, one starts receiving subtle hints along the lines of: "If you can't do it, we can always bring someone else who does".

author: Raj
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 23, 2020, 05:12:13 am
content: Quote from: Wojciech Krolopp on May 22, 2020, 09:43:51 pmCan't be racist to your own race, can you be? :pEdit: it becomes self reflectionQuote from: schmitt trigger on May 22, 2020, 10:32:11 pmnon euclidean geometry

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 23, 2020, 05:36:27 am
content: The topic is a bit confusing...But I'll weigh in with Altium, with two dumb arse solutions that weren't needed:1) An FPGA development board that cost US$40002) Deciding that all electronics design in the future will be done with modules and FPGA's, including pre-existing PCB module layouts you just join together at the top level to create your project PCB. Therefore most designers will not need a PCB layout tool any more, so make the PCB layout module optional extra.Yes, seriously, a PCB layout tool company actually made their PCB layout tool optional extra.

author: Wojciech Krolopp
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: May 23, 2020, 05:54:05 am
content: Quote from: Raj on May 23, 2020, 05:12:13 amIf I said "all polacks are cockroaches and must be exterminated" - isn't that racism despite being polish myself?

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 23, 2020, 05:55:49 am
content: Quote from: Wojciech Krolopp on May 23, 2020, 05:54:05 amYou got owned, just drop it and move on.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 23, 2020, 06:49:22 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on May 23, 2020, 05:36:27 amDoes not surprise me at all, it's what happens when management do not understand their industry and Altium clearly have not for a while, just look at the circuit maker and studio fiasco's.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 25, 2020, 02:15:42 am
content: Quote from: Simon on May 23, 2020, 06:49:22 amIn the case of Altium at the time, there was no "management", every company decision and direction was the personal whim of the founder Nick Martin. After he was pushed out at least the company finally got focus and started running it like a proper business, other fiasco's not withstanding. Circuit Studio I believe was at the sole request of Element 14 who wanted a package they could sell to replace something else, Altium probably just shrugged their shoulders and went "hey, free money".

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2020, 04:20:49 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on May 25, 2020, 02:15:42 amThat sounds a bit like I place I used to work. We were a company of ~6,000 people by that time, and yet to hire anybody it had to be run by the CEO for approval. I got completely sick of interviewing candidates there, I lost count of the number of times we finally found someone good, only to move so excruciatingly slowly that they accepted another job by the time we got the OK to hire them.The same CEO once referred to a round of layoffs as "synergy actions", we used to snicker at all the corporate bs buzzwords in the company wide emails he would send out.