Closing Control Loops

So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience, 
and (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and 
thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific 
information like conferences and magazines.

The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the 
subject should be self explanatory.  So if you feel that you're in the 
target audience, and if you're in a generous mood, here are some 
questions I have for you:

What do they call you at work (sorry -- what's your official job title?)

What magazines do you read?  Websites you visit regularly?

Do you go to conferences?  Which ones?  (this is the one that motivated 
this posting, by the way -- I only go to the Embedded Systems 
Conference; I know there's a circuit-related one in Silicon Valley but I 
can't remember the name, nor do I know if there are any ones anywhere else.

Have you had to close a control loop recently?  Did you do a web search? 
  What keywords did you use?

Have you read any related books?  Was it just a college text, or was it 
specifically directed at closed loop control for the practicing embedded 
systems designer?  What did you think of it?  What was it?

Thanks in advance.

-- 

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

On Fri, 24 Feb 2006 10:39:46 -0800, Tim Wescott wrote:

> Have you had to close a control loop recently?  Did you do a web search?
>   What keywords did you use?

Isn't that what academicians call "negative feedback"? ;-)

Good Luck!
Rich

"Tim Wescott" <tim@seemywebsite.com> wrote in message 
news:EqmdnWnD9PR-z2LenZ2dnUVZ_s2dnZ2d@web-ster.com...
> So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
> marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
> good answers to, because (a) I'm

A self procreating fuck up?

> Tim Wescott
> Wescott Design Services
> http://www.wescottdesign.com
>
> Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/ 

Genome wrote:

> "Tim Wescott" <tim@seemywebsite.com> wrote in message 
> news:EqmdnWnD9PR-z2LenZ2dnUVZ_s2dnZ2d@web-ster.com...
> 
>>So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
>>marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
>>good answers to, because (a) I'm
> 
> 
> A self procreating fuck up?
> 

:)

-- 

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

On Fri, 24 Feb 2006 20:21:10 GMT, "Genome" <ilike_spam@yahoo.co.uk>
wrote:

>"Tim Wescott" <tim@seemywebsite.com> wrote in message 
>news:EqmdnWnD9PR-z2LenZ2dnUVZ_s2dnZ2d@web-ster.com...
>> So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
>> marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
>> good answers to, because (a) I'm
>
>A self procreating fuck up?

Hmm.  That's the finest definition of life I've heard!

Jon

Hi Tim

> So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
> marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
> good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience, and 
> (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and 
> thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific 
> information like conferences and magazines.
>
> The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the 
> subject should be self explanatory.  So if you feel that you're in the 
> target audience, and if you're in a generous mood, here are some questions 
> I have for you:
>
> What do they call you at work (sorry -- what's your official job title?)

They call me Software Engineer (they call me other names too when they find 
bugs in the software, but I doubt you are interested in knowing), but my 
business card says Software
Development Manager.


> What magazines do you read?
Nuts and Volt, Servo, Motorcyclist, Computer, IEEE Potentials, Dr. Dobbs


> Websites you visit regularly?
Google news, Orkut, CNN


> Do you go to conferences?  Which ones?  (this is the one that motivated 
> this posting, by the way -- I only go to the Embedded Systems Conference; 
> I know there's a circuit-related one in Silicon Valley but I can't 
> remember the name, nor do I know if there are any ones anywhere else.

Not so often, I wish I had the money/time to attend to more conferences. The
last one was IC-AI (International Conference on Artificial Intelligence)
which I published and presented a paper.


> Have you had to close a control loop recently?  Did you do a web search? 
> What keywords did you use?

Yes. Yes. PID control; control theory; fuzzy control


> Have you read any related books?  Was it just a college text, or was it 
> specifically directed at closed loop control for the practicing embedded 
> systems designer?  What did you think of it?  What was it?

Yes. A couple of books actually.
Got some hints from Schaums for control theory, and two other books that I
borrowed from the university's library.
The problem with all of them is that they go deep on the math of control
theory but are not practical (no relationship between CT and embedded
devices)



Do I get a free book? ;)

Good luck with your publishing... A man has three missions on Earth: Have
kids, plant a tree and write a book. I accomplish the first two... someday
I'll write a book.

Cheers

Padu

"Tim Wescott" <tim@seemywebsite.com> wrote in message
news:EqmdnWnD9PR-z2LenZ2dnUVZ_s2dnZ2d@web-ster.com...
> So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's
> marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have
> good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience,
> and (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and
> thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific
> information like conferences and magazines.
>
> The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the
> subject should be self explanatory.

I hopr you have lest out Nyquist diagrasm and Root Locus. Never seen anybody
using them on a real design other than academics.


Tam

On Friday, in article
     <EqmdnWnD9PR-z2LenZ2dnUVZ_s2dnZ2d@web-ster.com>
     tim@seemywebsite.com "Tim Wescott" wrote:

>So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
>marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
>good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience, 
>and (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and 
>thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific 
>information like conferences and magazines.

They need what they think they need for standard tick box list of checks.

>The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the 
>subject should be self explanatory.  So if you feel that you're in the

Sounds like a sensible idea fo a book..
 
>target audience, and if you're in a generous mood, here are some 
>questions I have for you:
>
>What do they call you at work (sorry -- what's your official job title?)

I used to have all sorts of job titles, as often every company has different
meanings for job titles (let alone the made up ones that appear now).

Having spent over 12 years working for myself in a one man company I
have various titles (some legal, some other meanings) depending on what
I am doing at the time and the questioner. Job titles only really have
relevance to questions.

>What magazines do you read?  Websites you visit regularly?

Magazines IEE/IEEE periodicals (some), Circuit Cellar..

Websites are not something I spent a lot of regular time on specific ones
as it depends what I am working on or doing, except in bursts for datasheets
or specific issues, it would be Dilbert, Google, Ebay.

>Do you go to conferences?  Which ones?  (this is the one that motivated
>this posting, by the way -- I only go to the Embedded Systems 
>Conference; I know there's a circuit-related one in Silicon Valley but I 
>can't remember the name, nor do I know if there are any ones anywhere else.

Never gone to a conference, occasionally seem some of the papers. From
various sources it depends on the hosting country, speakers country,
sometimes who is sponsoring their 'research' and what is deemed patentable
under which jurisdiction as to whether you see enough detail anyway. I know
of cases in many fields where published papers are very 'sanitised' for
varying reasons to make you wonder if the paper is worthwhile.

>Have you had to close a control loop recently?  Did you do a web search?
>  What keywords did you use?

Mainly revisiting various loop controls/tuning for PID, servo loops and
nuances. Considering some of the project time spans, recent could be two
years (due to many other things).

>Have you read any related books?  Was it just a college text, or was it 
>specifically directed at closed loop control for the practicing embedded 
>systems designer?  What did you think of it?  What was it?

Most of them I found too abstract or too ideal mathematical models with lots
of assumptions. some of the worst assumptions I have seen is we have a model
for an actutator/motor that applies to all actuators/motors, where as in
real life modeling of the subsystem is quite complex and cannot always be
done theoretically but has to be done at first empirically as the full design
is 'n' stages down the road. In one instance to get the model and even think
of tuning it was complicated by differing response times of sensors to software

        Quadrature encoders
        position indicators
        optical position from line scan processing

Further complicated by temperature, standing or moving before hand or worse
still some of it was effected by different control loops controlling
high voltage light sources and other parts of the system.

That was even before you looked at mechanical interactions, tolerances,
determining fault conditions (mechanical, electrical, optical).

Too often the books forget about fault conditions, that can be directly
determined or have to be determined from other sources.

A lot of theory books are a bit like the old sciences joke

        A bookie wanted to know if there was a scientific way to
        determine the outcome of any horse race, so he asked the
        three scientists.

        The chemist said "Too many unknowns and variables"

        The biologist said "Too many factors to make it possible"

        The Physicist said "Yes"

        When the bookie asked how, the physicist said

                "For spherical horses in a vacuum"

The worst demo of control software for computer (PC and larger) data
acquistion systems I saw had classic limits and real world is somewhere
else issues. Basically the demo consisted of a model of a simple oven that
was heated and its temperature would rise, until the door was opened. The
longer the door was closed or open the higher or lower the temperature would
go.

Now those here would hopefully know that if the door was opened the lowest
temperature that could be reached was ambient in real life, in a model
should be absolute zero. This model had no limits so the temperature could
go below absolute zero or higher than the sun! So did not show the software
in best light of showing how good the software could be.

Hopefully your book will not be like that.

-- 
Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
<http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/>    PC Services
<http://www.gnuh8.org.uk/>              GNU H8 & mailing list info
<http://www.badweb.org.uk/>             For those web sites you hate

Tim Wescott wrote:
> So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
> marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
> good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience, 
> and (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and 
> thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific 
> information like conferences and magazines.
> 
> The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the 
> subject should be self explanatory.  So if you feel that you're in the 
> target audience, and if you're in a generous mood, here are some 
> questions I have for you:
> 
> What do they call you at work (sorry -- what's your official job title?)
> 
> What magazines do you read?  Websites you visit regularly?
> 
> Do you go to conferences?  Which ones?  (this is the one that motivated 
> this posting, by the way -- I only go to the Embedded Systems 
> Conference; I know there's a circuit-related one in Silicon Valley but I 
> can't remember the name, nor do I know if there are any ones anywhere else.
> 
> Have you had to close a control loop recently?  Did you do a web search? 
>  What keywords did you use?
> 
> Have you read any related books?  Was it just a college text, or was it 
> specifically directed at closed loop control for the practicing embedded 
> systems designer?  What did you think of it?  What was it?
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 

I knew it! 
http://books.elsevier.com/us//elsevier/us/subindex.asp?maintarget=&isbn=0750678399&country=United+States&srccode=&ref=&subcode=&head=&pdf=&basiccode=&txtSearch=&SearchField=&operator=&order=&community=elsevier
The book is too small.

On Fri, 24 Feb 2006 10:39:46 -0800, Tim Wescott <tim@seemywebsite.com>
wrote:
>So, I've put the finishing touches on my book, and the publisher's 
>marketing department is asking me questions.  Some of them I don't have 
>good answers to, because (a) I'm on the fringe of my target audience, 
>and (b) everyone learns differently, and my way is through osmosis and 
>thinking, which doesn't make it easy to cough up a bunch of specific 
>information like conferences and magazines.
>
>The book's title is "Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems", the 
>subject should be self explanatory.  So if you feel that you're in the 
>target audience, and if you're in a generous mood, here are some 
>questions I have for you:

>What do they call you at work (sorry -- what's your official job title?)
 Engineer

>What magazines do you read?  Websites you visit regularly?
 EETimes, Sensors, Medical Devices, Machine Design
 IEEE Spectrum, .....for some reason they won't send me ESP
 I got ESP back in 1995, but they won't renew my free subscription :(
 CircuitCellar, Nuts and Volts, sometimes Servo.

>Do you go to conferences? 
  No. Can't justify the cost. Way to expensive considering the
  lost time, conference fees and travel costs.  

>Have you had to close a control loop recently? 
> Did you do a web search?    What keywords did you use?
  Sure, but what does that have to do with the websearch?

>Have you read any related books?  Was it just a college text, or was it 
>specifically directed at closed loop control for the practicing embedded 
>systems designer?  What did you think of it?  What was it?

Quantum Programming. I thought it was great! 
A good summary of state machines and an alterative ways to use them. 

On Time and Under Pressure by Ed Sullivan. An old book. .  A great
overview of what makes a great organization tick, particularly the
Version Control and Automated Build processes,

Patent it Yourself, David Pressman.  A great step by step process for
submitting a patent.

The Scientist and Engineer's Guide to Digital Signal Processing
Free PDF book.  I've been reading chapters. Great stuff.

I don't generally read "controls" books anymore unless they are
product manuals. For anything new, I'll read technical publications,
or the web.  For anything old I just refer to my bookshelf.

>Thanks in advance.
>Tim Wescott
>Wescott Design Services
>http://www.wescottdesign.com