Happy 10th Anniversary! - A Decade of element14 Community

Happy 10th Anniversary element14!  And here is to many more years of operation!

• What have been your key defining moments over the past 10 years as part of the Community or in Tech?

For me, the past 10 years have been an amazing ride. I had the opportunity to work on some amazing people and technologies, developing products for life sciences (utilizing image processing), targeting the health and beauty industry (lasers/LEDs) and high tech lighting (ZigBee mesh). It also found me transitioning in a semi-retired status and enjoying my grandchildren (new full time job).  Technology wise, there were countless changes and even some time to look into some old school technologies and build on understanding electronics.

• How long have you been a member?

Although my profile shows a date of July 2016, I really joined and became a member of the community in October of 2017.  I have participated in other online communities, doing blogging and such, but element14 was the first time that it really felt like it was a community. I have really come to enjoy being a member and sharing ideas and thoughts with such a friendly and diverse group of members.

• What are your fondest memories of the element14 Community?
  

A couple of things really stand out in terms of my element14 community memories.  The first was the first time that someone offered me their friendship.  John Wiltrout (jw0752 ) was heading out to California on a roadtrip and planned to be in the San Antonio area, so he invited me and my wife out to lunch.  That was a very nice lunch and the beginning of a great friendship.  Also, actively participating with the community through project14 contests and getting such great feedback for community members was also a really great experience and memory (winning prizes was also great).

• Perhaps most useful or surprising technology from 2009?

Working with some of the early version of ARM cortex processors, back in 2009, was a giant step forward from some of the smaller microprocessors that I had been using.  The available power (speed, memory and peripherals) was really amazing.  But even with all that power, it was clear that solid programming techniques and creative problem solving with still vital to delivering high quality products to our customers.

Finding a home at element14 has been a highlight event for me.  I look forward to continuing with this adventure and meeting and collaborating with more of my fellow element14 members.

Gene

Happy 10th Anniversary Element14 !!

• What have been your key defining moments over the past 10 years as part of the Community or in Tech?

I can think think of couple of such moments: the first is when I decided to apply for my first roadtest, shortly after joining the community, back in March 2017. The second is getting back to FPGA technology, after almost 2 decades, and getting acquainted with the new toolsets and the enormous flexibility it offers, again thanks to the roadtest program.

• How long have you been a member?

I have been a member since 2017. Holding a full time job and a family with 2 kids doesn't make it easy to be as active in the community as I would like to (I'm still trying to push myself to take part to the fantastic Project14 competition and Design Challenge...you never know!)

• What are your fondest memories of the element14 Community

There are many that spring to mind, but definitely my fondest memories are from the very beginning of my participation to the community, all the kind and encouraging messages and comments I received. They definitely helped me and made me feel welcomed.

• Perhaps most useful or surprising technology from 2009?

For this one, I thought I had to google what were the hot technologies in 2009, as I could not remember any of the top of my head! But I found some of my old phones from about that time (for the joy of my wife, I have this urge to keep all the pieces of technology I own, including all the mobile phones I owned), and that reminded me that Android OS was moving its first steps as smartphone OS alternative just around that time (I remember some of my phones at the time used Windows Mobile OS and Symbian)

Fabio

10 years is a long time on tech. It's impressive how the community has thrived over that time. That's not easy. I'm looking forward to seeing how the E14 community develops over the next 10.

• What have been your key defining moments over the past 10 years as part of the Community or in Tech?

I suppose the most defining moments are the numerous RoadTests I have participated in. As a RoadTest-a-holic, I have amassed a valuable and indispensable collection of test equipment which I use to RoadTest other equipment and answer various questions of my own interest. Winning RoadTest of the Year for 2018 was the icing on the cake. Having the opportunity to represent element14 at the ElectroneX trade expo and host a webinar have also been highlights, along with being part of the Top Members group. Finally, I'd have to say running my own blog has been very defining as well, allowing me to communicate my knowledge to many more people than I could have ever directly meet with in a lifetime.

• How long have you been a member?

The records suggest that I've been a member for about eight years. It doesn't feel like it - perhaps because I spent the first few years lurking rather than posting, instead, only applying for RoadTests.

• What are your fondest memories of the element14 Community or

Actually, I'd have to say when all the Top Members got accidentally wiped out and then reinstated. That was pretty funny.

• Perhaps most useful or surprising technology from 2009?

I'd have to say, cost-effective 802.11g which finally bought Wi-Fi up to speeds which were actually good enough to actually do something with and not break the bank. The previous 802.11b with 11Mbit/s PHY rate offered something closer to 4.5Mbit/s of actual throughput assuming a good signal, not enough to stream a DVD. The later 802.11g had a much bigger 54Mbit/s PHY rate with real-life throughput of 22Mbit/s not unusual, although 17Mbit/s was probably more the norm. That was fast enough to carry most residential broadband connections with no wires, or support multiple clients without worrying about airtime hogs. It was also cheaper and had greater range, thanks to the introduction of more integrated mixed-signal design chipsets.

- Gough

I have been a member since 2011, there was a presentation of the site by a Farnell person at our university. However, regular visits and engagement begun in 2017, when I got more free time at work and home. My first memories - I had only two friends that liked electronics and I haven't seen them very often (the worked in a different field and one moved far away). Element14 was a place where I found many electronics enthusiasts, got helped and inspired. Things happen here 24/7 and it is up to every single person how much they engage.

I started watching the Ben Heck Show and I can't even imagine how hard it must have been to create a presentable product or prototype every week. Amazing work.

One of the biggest advantages is to have so much various materials: blog posts with news and projects, webinars, learning modules and especially road tests. Nothing teaches you more than holding a piece of hardware/software in your hands and evaluating it yourself.

Here are some remarkable Tech moments for me:

• When I started with microcontrollers (PICs), (non original) programmer/debugger cost > $100, original many times more. Currently, it is common to get a development kit with everything integrated for $20. There has never been a better time to start development of anything!
• Raspberry Pi and Arduino are perfect examples. Pieces of technology that are easy to use, with huge community around. I was always more into bare metal programming, but for quick evaluation, they are much faster.
• 10 years back, we used a digital camera at home for taking all the pictures. We had no video recorder, nor player. I wouldn't believe a decent cell phone would replace both of these devices for most of the use cases at home and work. Documentation, inspection, diagnostics... everything is so much easier now.
• I participated in three Project14 themes and was always positively surprised how the initial project idea evolves. The key is to start doing, make something useful, fun, or just explore the possibilities. The broad variety of ideas of all participants is also incredible.
• AMD managed to get back into the CPU market, so there is no longer a monopoly and slow development cycle of CPUs caused by no real competition.
• I hope that the crypto mining fever is slowly falling down - one of the biggest waste of power and semiconductors used mainly for speculation.
• Phone manufacturers realised their devices need updates. Both security and performance. My first Android phone (Samsung Galaxy S3 mini) was so slow I couldn't even answer a phone call fast enough, so the person usually hung up.

Glad to be here.

David

10 years ago in computer years was about 4 computers ago.

So here is my baseline from 10 years ago:

• I was still running Windows ME with a lot of Visual Basic 6 programs
• I had not tried an arduino. I was interested in simple low cost microcontrollers and was using things like BasicX from Netmedia
• I was using an Olympus E-100RS digital camera with a whopping 1.3 Megapixels of resolution (now it is a 20Mpixel Panasonic FZ1000)
• I was sporting a corporate Blackberry in a hip holster. (now I have several android devices at home and a corporate i-phone)
• My main fabrication machine was a drill press
• The technology that blew me away in 2009 was the 3D movie Avatar

The big maker milestones for me since then include:

• launch of Raspberry Pi in 2012 - its non-intuitive success means it went far beyond a few die-hard makers
• discovering element14 in 2013 - this changed everything - it changed what kind of projects I did, it changed how I did them, and changed how I documented them
• learning to use PSoC4 with PSoC Creator from Cypress Semiconductor - this helped win my first design challenge and a trip to Germany in 2014, where I got to meet some element14 members and staff.
• winning a Cel Robox 3D printer road test in 2014 - this sparked an instantaneous and complete paradigm shift in how I design mechanics and packaging
• Each road test, design challenge, project14 or special project I do on element14 is a special and memorable milestone for me. I summarize these activities in a blog each year: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 ....
• I finally started to win some instrument road tests in 2016, which have provided an enormous boost to my bench instrumentation and my test capabilities. I still find it hard to believe I now have several instruments that I could never justify purchasing on my own.
• I was worried that the acquisition by Avnet would adversely affect the forum, but it has only been getting better.
• 2017 saw the introduction of Project14 which adds a whole extra dimension to participation on the forum. I think participation by the Top Member group in defining Project14 was the most satisfying contribution that group has had to the forum.
• In 2017 I was awarded the Member of the Year trophy, Project of the Year and Road Tester of the Year - that was indeed a special milestone.
• In 2018 I tried collaborating on a design challenge - that was a milestone and a challenge in itself
• 2018 saw the sad end of the Ben Heck Show but the rise of element14 presents with some really great content.
• Over the last 10 years, from my perspective, the forum has continuously improved, and it is very significantly better than even a few years ago. The current staff have done a great job in making element14 the best technical forum on the planet. The quality and the quantity of member generated content is going up and so is the quality and quantity of staff generated content.

If I had to pick a favorite project in the last 10 years, I think it would be my Sudden Impact Design Challenge. I didn't win anything for it, but it combined analog and digital hardware, wireless charging, software, firmware, rf, mechanics, 3D printing, packaging, and physiology, to create an almost production ready product that crossed over from technology into sports and was actually used in hockey games. My hockey buddies still talk about it even though it has long faded from the forum spotlight.

And one more link from 2014 celebrating what the forum is about:

It is great to be able to celebrate 10 years of element14 success and happy memories - element14 needs to be celebrated - it is such a rare and massive and special accomplishment.

Happy 10 years to Element14 Community Glad to be part of it.

Some old Element14 YouTube videos that I found on YouTube, (if you find an older version of this, please comment it below). I'll also update the list as I dig deeper.

• Element14 demo - 29 May 2009 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jaZMO0Uq5g  - Who is Mr. P? This is a 10-year-old video. I don't know if this is official (since the channel is no longer available)

• RoadTest demo - 1 Aug 2011 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQz5h5gxJ0A
• Community Showcase - 21 Jun 2011 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeYrjXLhgIo

• Element14 TV !? - 19 Dec 2011 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntInpBZ-T5A - Who else loves Arduino Tutorial by Jeremy Blum guess what it is listed in the series of programs in Element14 TV. Also the Ben Heck Show

Element14 Video Uploads sorted by date oldest, Link - https://www.youtube.com/user/element14/videos?view=0&sort=da&flow=grid

I remember when the member of the month had his mug-shot on the front page. I might have my own screenshot from back then. Good times.