JB’s Circuit

Is it the world’s oldest-geared driven analog computer? That’s the claim of this admittedly unscientific web site called the “Museum of Unnatural Mystery.” I found the site while helping my 6th grade-level son decide on a topic for his weekly science exploration project at school. What struck his interest was Stonehenge, while my fancy was piqued by the Antikythera Mechanism.

Now, you may be asking yourself – as my wife asked of me – what Stonehenge has to do with science? My response was quick and assured; “The prevailing theory on the purpose of Stonehenge was that it was created by early astronomers to correlate the earth’s seasons with the rotation of the heavens.”

Had I stopped there, everything would have been fine. But, being a child of the 60’s, I couldn’t resist adding what I remembered of Erich von Daniken thoughts on Stonehenge as site of extraterrestrial visitations. Then there was my comment about a Dr Who episode that dealt with Stonehenge (“The Stones of Blood”). Her raised eyebrow was enough to confirm my fear that my services as my son’s science adviser would no longer be needed. C’est la vie!

BTW: Here’s a truly bizzard yet fairly entertaining – thanks to the Enya music selections – Youtube LEGO version of the Dr. Who episode.

Ah, the joys of meeting with startups! Don’t misunderstand me - I enjoy talking with the engineers and technical folks at startup companies. But the official press briefing of startup companies are often less than helpful. In fact, a handful of such briefings have become classics among editors for their consistent lack of useful information.

Chris Edwards, well-known UK writer, has a great post about the lack of satisfaction in startups briefings in the latest Publitek Media News. Here’s one of my favorite quotes:

… going to startup briefings can be a lot less rewarding than simply surfing the web or turning up to conferences. I’m coming across more situations where the press meeting contains almost no useful information. Yet the CTO is spilling the beans to an audience of engineers in another room.

Press briefings are usually the last thing most startups think about. And it shows.

Chanced upon a discussion of the “First Law of Technology” at a Technology and Innovation Strategies event on FaceBook:

“The First Law of Technology says that “with every change in technology that affects consumer behavior, we always overestimate the impact in the short term, but then underestimate the full impact over the long term.” The original dot-com era a decade ago was overhyped, but by now the Web has become a utility, increasingly available anywhere for any purpose. This is the Information Age, yet we’re just beginning to gather the information and understanding to know how it changes our lives.” — L. Gordon Crovitz, the former publisher of the Wall Street Journal

Really, this should have been called the “First Law of Technology” for economists. Nevertheless, I’m curious what the second law would look like? Perhaps it would be as following – taking my lead from the Second Law of Thermodynamics:

The Second Law of Technology states that consumer behavior within a global system which is not yet in equilibrium will favor products that result in the lowest profit margin for their producers. This is an expression of the universal law of increasing product commoditization. The latest casualty of the law has been microprocessor hardware, soon to be followed by EDA tools.

Seriously; Does anyone know the “official” Laws of Technology? Are there any? If so, are they akin to Putt’s Laws?  BTW - I think I know the true identity of Archibald Putt. Lucky me. <grin>

A recent “Silicon Forest Blog” notes that VC investment in US companies is down by 7 percent from the first three months of last year.

While it’s too early to forecast a trend in funding, it is interesting to compare this data point with the recent acquisition – say, in the last 3 to 4 months – of EDA companies. Here’s my very unofficial short list:

• Syplicity-Hardi acquired by Synopsys
• ChipEstimate acquired by Cadence
• Novas acquired by Springsoft (parent company)
• Ansoft acquired by Ansys (simulation sw)
• Sirific Wireless acquired by Icera Inc (SDR modem chipsets)
• Sabio Labs acquired by Magma Design
• AMIS (parts of LSI and AD) acquired by ON SemiconductorNovelics joint deal with Synopsys

These two data sets seem to beg the question: Are the number of available EDA start-ups actually shrinking? Does anyone really know?

BTW: I have some interesting data of my own (thx to sources that I’ll share later). Look for that in the next few weeks.

Spent most of the last three days (Apr 14^th - 16^th) attending the Embedded Systems Conference in San Jose, CA. Met with lots of companies, which I’ll report on later. But here’s my quick take on the conference:

Impressions:

• Technical sessions seemed well attended and interesting.

• Traffic on the show floor seemed lighter this year over last year. Not bad, just a bit lighter. This made for an easier parking situation.

• Keynote address started with an entertaining video that highlighted the history of embedded systems. I left shortly after Jack Ganssle started his presentation. Would have liked to stay to listen to Jack and the other speakers, but my publisher had other ideas for my time.

• No real earth-shaking technology was introduced at the show, which is OK since lots of incremental improvements in existing technology were presented, especially in those products aimed at the mobile, multimedia consumer market.

Here’s a short list of my more interesting meetings (all at the show, except where noted):

• Xelerated – network proessor technology (not at the show)
• NXP Semi – ARM9 microcontrollers with tons of peripherals
• Intel Embedded - demos of Atom processor and more
• Mentor – Embedded Group
• Moschip - ICs for networking
• Sidence – memory (had to walk to the “IP” show at the Fairmont for this one)
• XMOS – Software define silicon. The image below is the XMOS XS1-G Development Kit. Very aesthetic with it’s blue glow.

• Elsevier - lots of new embedded titles, including one by Max Domeika on multicore programming
• Ceva – DSP cores
• Congatec – embedded computer boards
• Sun Microsystems - chip multi-threading (CMT) processor designs
• Chartered Semi (not at the show)
• Actel – programmable logic (antifuse and flash FPGAs)
• Power.org group

Coolest technology:

> Met with Brian, one of the inventors/entrepreneurs vying for Google Lunar X-Prize moon rover project. Brain, supported in this effort by his wife, is an ordinary fellow with the drive and daring to bring his idea for a moon rover to fruition. You can also see a Video of the Rover’s first trip outdoors on YouTube.

Oddest sights:

> Eco-lounge at the entrance to the ESC exhibit hall. This “lounge,” was nothing more than a bunch of colorful bean-bag chairs scattered around for attendees benefit. Nice idea, but in all honesty bean bag “chairs” are not all that comfy for anyone over 25. Plus, there is no way to gracefully stand up from the bags.

> Much better than the bean bag chairs - though equally odd - was the “multimedia” chair at the CEVA booth. The multimedia system was powered by CEVA’s DSP technology. Note the weary editor taking a much deserved break.

Interesting article in the Guardian about the evolution (or de-evolution) of Wikipedia. A bit long, but offers of view of Wikipedia that I hadn’t seen. For example:

”… one of the most thoughtful observers of Wikipedia’s history, told a Canadian reporter: “The preference now is for excising, deleting, restricting information rather than letting it sit there and grow.””

And the great experiment in Internet democracy continues.

Missed this April Fool’s joke from Bluespec last week while attending Globalpress. The pun focused on atomic transaction which relate to actions in a single, indivisible transaction. Apparently, atomic transactions show promise in the next generation of programming languages for multi-core apps. [Same idea as atomicity from database designs. One of Date's principle structures in databases.]

At any rate, Bluespec had a little fun with the phase: “I’m puzzled how they came to this misunderstanding about our technology. We’ve never, nor will we ever, split an atom. The transactions are atomic dag-nabbit – that’s the point!” reacted Rishiyur S. Nikhil, CTO of Bluespec, Inc

Nicely done, Bluespec!

Physists Says Time Travel not only Possible, but Likely.

His book would probably sell more copies if his future self came back for a book signing. <grin> Plus, this was covered by FoxNews. Enough said.

And his name isn’t really “Dr Who.”

Lots going on at Globalpress. Great EDA and semiconductor discussions. But, alas, I have no time (or hardware) to do anything but short posts. Look for more later this week, once I return. You can track my micoblog on twitter, if you’re really bored.

Ah, our updated Chip Design homepage is finally live! More content, better metrics, new features for multimedia editorial. Very nice….