Idle thoughts, irony...

While reading the usual morning mail, a bit of irony chased its way through my gray matter. While on my recent trip to the Bay Area, both to attend part of VCF and do a little scrounging, I was high bidder for a nice HP 545A logic probe a fellow had up on E-pay (around $25 if I recall). I was able to pick it up while on said trip, as he lived in south San Jose. Picking this up completed my collection of HP's logic probe/troubleshooting family: Probe, pulser, and current tracer. To this day, I still consider this set one of the best for poking around in both legacy and current logic circuits. A few months back, when I'd gotten hold of the current tracer, several folks were envious, though I couldn't understand why even after asking around and getting a basic idea of what it was used for. I'm now well into my second year towards my A.A.S. degree in Electronics, and my current class is Intro to Digital circuits. I find it most ironic that my textbook, published less than a year ago, should make extensive reference to all THREE HP probes (which were first developed in the mid-70's or earlier), including the current tracer, and show clear illustrations of how they're all used to find stuck levels, shorted inputs, etc. What works well does indeed endure. ;-) I do not regret going back to college, despite the effort of cramming Boolean algebra and Karnaugh maps into my gray matter! (though I find I really do like working with Karnaughs. They simplify things immensely!) On we go... -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho, Blue Feather Technologies http://www.bluefeathertech.com // E-mail: kyrrin(a)bluefeathertech.com Amateur Radio: WD6EOS since Dec. '77 "Our science can only describe an object, event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot, in any way, define any of them..."