Archives: Articles
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Gordon Bell, 1934-2024: Grandmaster of Computer Architecture, Wizard of VAX, Inventor of the UART, Founder of the Computer History Museum
Gordon Bell may have worn badge number 80 at Digital Equipment Corp (DEC), but he had a profound influence on the development of minicomputers, including…
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Bota Systems Gives Robots the Sense of Touch
Let’s commence this column by performing a simple thought experiment. Suppose I were to give you a bolt and associated nut and tell you to…
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The First ICs on the Moon – The Apollo Guidance Computer, Part 2
Part 1 of this article discussed the Fairchild resistor-transistor logic (RTL) NOR gate ICs used in the Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) for NASA’s manned lunar…
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Ceva-Waves Links Multi-Protocol Wireless Connectivity IP
I’m afraid that (what I laughingly refer to as) my mind is wandering (as is its wont). It knows it’s supposed to write about multi-protocol…
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The First ICs on the Moon – The Apollo Guidance Computer, Part 1
In a speech made at Rice University on May 25, 1961, twenty days after Alan Shepard became the first American astronaut to fly into space…
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Capturing 3D Images from 2D CMOS Sensors (One Sensor, One Frame –> 3D Point Cloud)
A new sensor technology just popped up under my nose shouting “SURPRISE” (metaphorically speaking, of course). In this case, we’re talking about a technology that…
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A Last Embedded Dance with Jack Ganssle
I’ve known embedded system guru Jack Ganssle for four decades. He and I both started designing embedded systems in the 1970s, when the early 8-bit…
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IBM Research Fellow Robert H. Dennard, 1932-2024: Inventor of the DRAM, Formulated MOS Scaling Law
Robert Dennard spent more than half a century working at one company: IBM. During his tenure at IBM, Dennard worked on a variety of advanced…
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Are Holographic Displays the Ultimate UI for AI?
1947 was an interesting year. Not that I was there myself, you understand, but I’ve heard stories. For example, 1947 was the year the Hungarian-British…
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My AI Will Be Watching You (Part 2)
“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so,” as Ford Prefect said to Authur Dent in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I’d like to say…