Giving away the secrets of electronics?

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Flyback

Well-Known Member
Hi,
I have been fixing up a bog standard couple of hard switched converters for a customer.
Its bare basic , “electrician level” electronics, but tomorrow, I am being taken to their customer, to answer questions about “giving away secrets”…in relation to these bog standard hard switched converters.
I have never given away real secrets about anything……and these circuits that I have been working on are literally "electrician level" SMPS designs……the sort of thing you get demo boards on for a couple of quid. The sort of thing that App notes talk about in droves.
The sort of schems that are strewn all over the internet.
They are the sorts of SMPS that a 14 year old could design. It’s the simplest level of electronics….no more secret than an electricians knowledge.

It’s the knowledge of SMPS, that got outsourced to the Pacific Rim years ago…….as if there are secrets in this?.....secrets no way. If it was secret, why all SMPS work is outsourced to the Pacific Rim? They blame people like me for the fact that China is a million miles ahead of the west in SMPS design. Its the west's own fault...for outsourcing massive amounts of SMPS work to the Far East.

Has anybody else ever been to one of these inquests? What happens?
 
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It was the same for disk drives in the 1980's. We had embedded servo technology and the rest of the world did not. They can ask all the questions they want, but as you say you are in no real position to answer them. Just go along for the ride and deflect. You might ask a few questions of your own about where they are getting their information, but I wouldn't worry too much about it.
 
The Japanese (Hitachi, Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Toshiba) have far higher quality power supplies than the Chinese. In Canada in the 70'80's the likes of Hammond , Brown and others were pioneers of SMPS as well as many others pioneered the technology in USA and worldwide. The Chinese just mastered the low labour rates and cost-reductions with volumes of local parts with clever packaging. The Chinese also have more engineers than the ROTW.
 
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The "secret" in this Fourier Analysis is that the fundamental sine peak is 27% higher inside as a component of the white square wave peak but the red square wave has residual harmonics shown here are a result of removing harmonics by the equivalent of a a "brick wall" LPF to 11*f and not by adding harmonic energy.
 
There was no outcome. The TS abandoned the thread after his initial post. In over half a century I never experienced the sort of "inquest" he described. Apparently, nobody else has either. I think he made it up. I was called as an expert witness in a patent litigation case involving a former employer and one of their competitors. Their attorneys paid me 30x what I made as a working engineer. Nice work if you can get it.

908 F2d 931 Northern Telecom Inc v. Datapoint Corporation | OpenJurist

openjurist.org
 
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Let us recall, in real life, revealing what may be called a technical secret doesn't imply, for sure, that the other side can get it properly to take advantage of it.
On the other hand, if one works in a formal group, he has no right to talk to an outsider about anything related to his group's work (including his) if he is not allowed to do it by the group's head.

Not being a member in any formal group (social, sportive, industrial, political or religious) in my life, I had no secrets to hide every time I was asked about things, technical or else (even personal). I just answer by what I have in mind about the subject of interest. I mean I don't betray anyone by doing so.
But I also understand whenever I meet someone who has no right even just to talk to me.

For instance, anyone can say "I am free" but being a real free person is another story.
Here is a funny example. Can a man live with the woman he loves, openly and for life, without getting the permission of a third party first which represents a social or religious authority? For a marriage to be accepted by a community anywhere in the world, the couple should be submitted to a certain authority first which has to be also recognized by their community. In other words, a human is also free to choose not to be free
 
Pommie said:
Yes.

Mike.
Click to expand...
May I guess that the way you live with your wife as a family is also followed by most men, if not all, in your region?

Anyway, such a marriage would be the real one for being the union of two free independent humans who accepted to be unified by the spirit of Love only, not by any law (social or religious)... "Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh."
 
I don't think I have ever met anyone who has no right to talk to me. I think that would be kind of hard to accomplish. Theories are a dime a bale in 10 bale lots.
 
Papabravo said:
I don't think I have ever met anyone who has no right to talk to me. I think that would be kind of hard to accomplish. Theories are a dime a bale in 10 bale lots.
Click to expand...
I believe you. You live in USA, right? It seems I couldn't be clear enough.
I don't see any ruling system in the world, other than the American one, having the power to impose on those who work in its big companies to close their doors if contacted from America. Only the powerful American system can do it.

I mean, we talk to each other here as friends because, on my side, I am a free person and, on your side, I guess you don't work now in a big company/corporation which has to observe the American regulations (otherwise, I am afraid you are breaking the rules ).

After all, in every region there are pros and cons. There is no paradise on earth. Fortunately, as I said on a previous post (on another thread),"almost all humans around the world are gifted to see as natural, if not good, whatever they became familiar to since their childhood". The good news is that, despite the big differences in cultures, I didn't meet yet a person, from anywhere in the world, who sees himself wrong in what he believes as being good and bad in life. I concluded that believing a truth is actually relative to the observer (much like in Relativity). Only in great speeches one may hear of absolute/universal truths (said political or religious). For example, is the scientific progress good or bad in human's life? Well, it depends on the observer if he is a victim of this progress or not
 
Yes, I have lived here all my life. I have worked in other countries including Europe and Japan. I have never worked in an environment where there was secret information so I cannot relate to what you are talking about. We all knew about TTL Integrated Circuits, how to build a processor from them, how to program that processor, and how to build useful peripheral devices like card readers, paper tape readers and punches, printers, and magnetic tape drives. It never once occurred to me that there was any reason not to share what we knew for the benefit of both companies. For the record our European and Japanese customers were far larger as corporate enterprises than we were. Our best year (ca. 1976) was maybe $78 million. That's small change by today's standards. Even back then their revenues were in the billions.
 
Pommie said:
I don't do sky fairies.

Mike.
Click to expand...

I am sorry. You don't have to explain anything.

I just thought I discovered, based on your 'Yes', a place on earth on which a 'formal' marriage is not a prerequisite for a female to 'be proud', in her community, for having and trusting a husband for life by 'her own will only'.

Could this place exist now or in the future? God only knows.

Anyway, if such informal marriage could exist someday, the couple likely need to register their union (family) at the birth of their first baby, the fruit of their true union, based on mutual love and trust, not on any law. But if there are no children, there would be no need for a further formal process.
 
I really don't understand what you are saying. There is a place where a formal marriage is not a .............. What am I talking about. Do you live in a place where females are considered inferior?

BTW, sky fairies refers to any theist.

Mike.
 
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