"The classic approach is to seek wisdom. Substantial
expertise exists but is concentrated in a small number of
corporate and academic areas. These resources are not
readily accessed by Everyman and some cynics might
suggest that they are deliberately protected by a self-
serving priesthood. A glance through conference pro-
ceedings and published literature yields either a storm of
mathematics or absurdly coy and simple little block dia-
grams that make everything look just so easy. Either way,
Everyman loses. And the poets don’t even get to try."
Application Note AN25-1 Switching Regulators for Poets,
Jim Williams / September 1987
Microchip AN1375: "See what you can do with the CTMU"
[Describes applications for the Charge Time Measurement Unit on PIC microcontrollers.]
[Applications 1 to 46, and then:]
Really Complex Applications
47. Solving World Hunger
By mass deploying inexpensive temperature (# 28) and humidity sensors (# 10), it becomes possible to make continuous, fine resolution measurements of climatic variation over large agricultural areas. This makes it possible, at least in theory, to create a closed-loop system of more precise water and nutrient delivery. This, in turn, can push crop yields to their maximum. Do this in enough places, and there will be enough food to feed everyone, everywhere. (Note that it was never said that this would be easy.)
48. Bring About World Peace
Admittedly, World Peace is still being worked on. It’s possible that it is beyond the scope of the CTMU, or it could be that it hasn’t been given enough time. Perhaps this issue is one that can be left to the readers.
What is this? The internet age is the age of information. No time in recorded history has ever allowed such an ease of finding information, decoding it, and applying.
Academia is easily accessible via google, even if all you can read is the abstract it gives a pretty good direction in which to proceed.
Companies like Tesla are open sourcing their patents.
Hackaday.io, Instructables.com and YouTube are exploding as the maker/hacker movement seeks to solve every little problem with everything.
September 1987 was 28 years ago, I really don't see how it applies to today, other than this project seeks to do what the description rails against.
Maybe I am just to daft to get it, please explain.
Did you use the "ease of finding information" of this era to find/read that Application Note? Highly recommended. In fact, I might just read it again, thanks :)
This is the most kick-ass-est Application Note I have ever read. I wonder if we should have a series on digging up and serving App Note and Data Sheet gems to our readers.
Microchip AN1375: "See what you can do with the CTMU"
[Describes applications for the Charge Time Measurement Unit on PIC microcontrollers.]
[Applications 1 to 46, and then:]
Really Complex Applications
47. Solving World Hunger
By mass deploying inexpensive temperature (# 28) and humidity sensors (# 10), it becomes possible to make continuous, fine resolution measurements of climatic variation over large agricultural areas. This makes it possible, at least in theory, to create a closed-loop system of more precise water and nutrient delivery. This, in turn, can push crop yields to their maximum. Do this in enough places, and there will be enough food to feed everyone, everywhere. (Note that it was never said that this would be easy.)
48. Bring About World Peace
Admittedly, World Peace is still being worked on. It’s possible that it is beyond the scope of the CTMU, or it could be that it hasn’t been given enough time. Perhaps this issue is one that can be left to the readers.
https://people.ece.cornell.edu/land/courses/ece4760/PIC32/CTMU/AN1375.pdf