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High School Dropout, Self-Taught Chip Designer
circletimessquare writes "The QVC television shopping network has recently found a hit in its product the C64, which emulates the classic Commodore 64 in a small form factor, a joystick. But the story of the designer of the product is more interesting than the product. Meet Jeri Ellsworth [NYTimes. You know what that means], whose life story emulates the golden age of garage-based computer design. She is proof that the passion of the homebrew electronic hobbyist is still a viable force in an age when well-funded and well-staffed corporate design teams dominate chip design."
The soul-saver strikes again (Karma Free, for your pleasure):
Reg Free Link
is she HOT?
Maybe in 20 years she can design a P75. That will show those corparte giants who is boss.
You forgot well-lawyered, for when an uppity innovator dares challenge the corporate status quo. Sadly, all it would take is one lawsuit (ore even the threat thereof) to shut her down.
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
It seems as though nostalgia always sells. I went to a local mall recently and there was a stand that was selling something similar to these-it was an N64 shaped controller with a decent collection of SNES games right in the controller. I know if I had money I'd buy it for a young relative to experience the joys of my own childhood. Wouldn't you?
damnit - i really did mean to post as AC ...
Start rolling out the "She is hot" and "I'd like her to play with my joystick" comments.
One more thing, can Slashdot's editors please stop whining about NYT's registration? To read their news for free just for filling in some info seems like a generous trade.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
I was just telling my wife about this last night.
Even when you think that any industry is too hard to break into because there are big companies dominating it, one can still create something that is better or worthwhile to people. Even for the sake that some people want to shop somewhere else, or buy a different brand.
I mean, think about it, for 50 years cars were being made and the corporations that made them became big 800lb gorillas. But then look, here comes Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Geo, Saturn, Lexus, Kia and now Scion.
So there is room, just take a look at the history of open source software.
Definitely cute, but standing next to a male skull with RAM sticks lodged in the cranium serve as an effective deterrent to sexual advances.
Let us hope there are many more people just like her here in America. If there are, the future will be very interesting. If there aren't, we'll find ourselves a nation of passive consumers without any initiative.
You're new here, aren't you?
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
She looks like a conniving elf in the picture. So in Slashdot terms, yes she's hot.
School is only a method of pointing you in the right direction to become educated and if you learned enough they give you a piece of paper that says you have learned stuff. If it weren't for regulations in such areas almost every job could possibly be done by a person who never graduated from high school or college. A person who is motivated enough will learn without the need of school. They can go the the library them self and learn information. They can read stories about how other people did things, they can educate themselves without the need for school.
I would like to think school is more a Map to show you were you can go for success. But just like driving on the road you don't always need a Map common since and some exploring will help you get to your location as well, sometimes (usually) a little longer then normal but sometimes a lot quicker. As well with schooling like driving with a Map if you don't know where you are or where you are going the Map is useless.
That said dropping out of school is still often a bad idea, because while you may get there by chance if you had a better education it will give you at least basic directions to start out on, training people with good research skills and the ability to learn for themselves.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
"She is NOT a self-taught CHIP DESIGNER. She is a self-taught FPGA programmer. There is a world of difference, the former is impossible, the latter is trivial."
Impossible? What about the guys who invented the first chips? Did they go to some class that taught how to build chips which will be invented in the future?
You can buy the same books that they have at schools. You can learn the same things on your own that you'd learn in schools. Some people (such as myself) are tinkerers, and we learn better by experimenting on our own than we do sitting in a classroom.
I find it funny that I've also heard people saying you need to go to school to be a programmer or work in the computer industry. Most of us geeks know that's also false.
[NYTimes. You know what that means]
That they're just making shit up?
Intel hired knitters for wiring the first set of chips back in the day.
Cobol was designed by a Grace Murray Hopper.
Frances Elizabeth Snyder Holberton was involved in Fortran's development.
Ada Lovelace wrote first program to calculate Bernouli numbers.
If you're going to troll, learn how to troll right.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
Maybe Bill Gates should have stayed in school and got a degree. He could have been rich, I tell you!
You do realize that Bill was rich before he founded Microsoft, right? His father is a millionaire.
It really makes you question your role in society...especially when it seems that women are portrayed like idiots or dumb blondes in the media. Or that all I should care about is makeup, clothes, and hair (trust me I'm not that obsessed - just ask my husband). Sometimes even today I ask myself "what they hell am I doing?" "Why didn't I do elementary ed like every girl I know?" It is still something I struggle with even today.
I always wished I could have had another woman to look up and admire for their technical achievements. I almost never thought it would happen in my lifetime. Congratulations to her on her long list of achievements, and hopefully she can encourage another generation of woman to get into tech....especially engineering!!
I really think that it's worth mentioning Jeri's other much more interesting and complicated project, the C-One. If you think the C64 joystick/computer is amazing, take a look at the C-One and you should be substantially more impressed:
http://c64upgra.de/c-one/
Just think what Ms. Ellsworth could have achieved with a proper education.
MUCH LESS
For the really creative problem solver types like her, school is a dangerous reconditioning of one's mind and social outlook. If you're not suited for it, excessive schooling/socialization can kill both your entrepreneurial spirit and your creative talent.
It is NOT ironic in the slightest that so many great innovators were drop-outs.
One only need to have been part of one of these mythical "well-funded and well-staffed" corporate teams (or to know someone who has been part of one) to know that the garage-based tech hobbyist is nowhere near extinction. High-power staffing and funds are nothing--NOTHING--next to the power of a real vision. A single person with a great idea and a little know-how can lay waste to any corporate team. Don't get so caught up with the corporate facade that you start to doubt it. Watch how many little companies with great ideas that corporations buy up. They do it so regularly that it hardly makes the news anymore. The real ideas aren't coming out of boardroom discussions.
And remember that IBM was once the indomitable corporate force and Apple and Microsoft were the little start-ups. That's why people who talk about how Linux won't change anything make me laugh. I don't even use Linux, not even a big fan of it, and I know it has yet to make its biggest impact. That's how this stuff works. Give it time. History repeats itself.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
L-edit is a polygon pusher. You are going to be pretty damn persistent to do anything more than a puny digital design in that.
For real digital layout you want to use Astro/Synopsys, Encounter/Cadence, Blast Fusion/Magma or Pinnacle/Sierra (Just maybe). None of these are going to cost you less than a few $100K.
Of cource before you to the point of doing layout you likely want to do synthesis (Although it is not beyond human capability to hand generate netlists). Design Compiler/Synopsys is pretty much the defacto standard but both cadence and magma has credible alternatives.
After layout you want to check your design for timing. To do this you want a Static Timing Analysis tool (Primetime from Synopsys is pretty much the only choice here for sign-off quality, though you might live with what your back-end tool has built in if you feel brave). To feed the STA tool with good data you need to extract the circuit: StarXTRC/Synopsys, Fire & Ice/Cadence, CalibreXRC are the prime contenders.
In addition you might want/need to do:
- Formal verification (To verify your final netlist conforms to your design)
- Rail analysis (To verify your power grid is adequate)
- Thermal analysis (To check your device won't melt of fail due to too high junction temperature)
- Crosstalk analysis (Check for parasitic effects on timing. Required for designs on 0.13um and better)
A complete tools suite for digital design will likely set you back $1000K. Naturally a lot of smaller designhouses will outsource the the implementation, but they will at minimum require simulators (minimum $5000 a seat) and synthesis ($100000 pr. license)
As for fabbing, $500? That would be a mighty sweet deal, even for a shared MPW run. With academic discounts and on an old process you might be able to get a slot on an MPW for $5000. On a reasonably modern process (like 0.18um) a engineering run with 6 prototyping wafers (i.e. not a MPW) will set you back somwhere between $50K to $200K
I'm halfway through the responses and haven't yet encountered a single comment about the greatness of this project!
/. disappoints once again.