"Retro Repair" key electronics skills?

[tony duell]

> > - Since I'm a coder, I understand boolean logic (which I hope would
> > help with ICs).
> 
> While it's an understandable point of view, especially for a coder, not
> all ICs are digital logic - and even for those that are, understanding
> non-digital-logic aspects of them can be useful.  (I built an EPROM

Remember one of Don Vonada's laws 'Digital Circuits are made from
Analogue Parts'

In my experience the most complex part of classic digital design (that
is interconnecting physical componets, which may or may not be ICs)
is the wiring. For anything of moderate speed you have to design the
interconnections as transmission lines, know how to terminate them 
and the like. You have to understand that no connection has 0 
impedance (0 resistance I can accept, but not 0 inductance or 0
capacitance to other connections). So what appears to be a solid
power or ground connection may have different voltages along it. 

Getting back to the original request, my main worry is the 80 hour
time limit. I am far from being the most knowledgeable person here,
and perhaps I am a very slow learner, but I must have spent over 
80 _thousand_ hours learning electronics and related subjeccts. And
FWIW I am still learning. 

-tony