These items are an archive of past Topical Smorgasbord items that have appeared on the RF Cafe homepage. In keeping with the "cafe" genre, these tidbits of information are truly a smorgasbord of topics. They all pertain to topics that are related to the general engineering and science theme of RF Cafe.
Please send me an
e-mail if you have a good subject.
National Competitiveness Rankings for 2008
(source: Financial Times) | Here is the Global Competitiveness Index rankings as determined by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum. | Country | 2008
2009 | 2007
2008 | | U.S. | 1 | 1 | | Switzerland | 2 | 2 | | Denmark | 3 | 3 | | Sweden | 4 | 4 | | Singapore | 5 | 7 | | Finland | 6 | 6 | | Germany | 7 | 5 | | Netherlands | 8 | 10 | | Japan | 9 | 8 | | Canada | 10 | 13 | | Hong Kong | 11 | 12 | | Britain | 12 | 9 |
Who would have guessed with all the U.S. bashing that we would still be in the #1 slot? |
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12-25-2008 Patent Prowess 2007
(source: IEEE Spectrum) | IEEE uses a variety of metrics to determine ranking in its patent survey. Total number of patents awarded weighs highly, but other factors like how often your patents are referenced by other patents also factors in. | 718 | Honeywell Int'l | | 463 | Lockheed Martin | | 402 | Boeing | | 97 | Airbus | | 96 | Hamilton Sundstrand | | 82 | Northrop Grumman | | 68 | Rockwell Collins | | 64 | BAE Systems | | 56 | EADS NV | | 56 | Raytheon |
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12-18-2008 | Top FLOPers of 2008
(source: IEEE Spectrum) | Here is the latest list of the world's top 10 supercomputers. It is a very dynamic list. | 1 | DOE/NNSA/LANL Roadrunner | | 2 | Oak Ridge National Laboratory Jaguar XT-5 | | 3 | NASA/Ames Research Center/NAS Pleiades | | 4 | DOE/NNSA/LLNL BlueGene/L | | 5 | Argonne National Laboratory Blue Gene/P | | 6 | Texas Advanced Computing Center/Univ. of Texas Ranger | | 7 | NERSC/LBNL Franklin | | 8 | Oak Ridge National Laboratory Jaguar XT-4 | | 9 | NNSA/Sandia National Laboratories Red Storm | | 10 | Shanghai Supercomputer Center Dawning 5000A |
|  Here is a cool map by NY Times.
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12-11-2008 Top 20 Semiconductor
Suppliers of 2008
(source: iSuppli) | iSuppli released their preliminary list of the top IC producers in 2008.
#1-5 are the same as in 2007. Total revenue was $267M, which is down 2% from 2007. | 1 | Intel | | 2 | Samsung | | 3 | Texas Instruments | | 4 | Toshiba | | 5 | STMicroelectronics | | 6 | Renesas | | 7 | Sony | | 8 | Qualcomm | | 9 | Hynix | | 10 | Infineon |
| | See the complete list here. |
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12-4-2008 |
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Top 10 Irritating Phrases
(source: Oxford U.) | This list has been compiled by researchers at Oxford University. | 1 | At the end of the day | | 2 | Fairly unique | | 3 | I personally | | 4 | At this moment in time | | 5 | With all due respect | | 6 | Absolutely | | 7 | It's a nightmare | | 8 | Shouldn't of | | 9 | 24/7 | | 10 | It's not rocket science |
| | Add your most hated phrase to the list here. |
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11-27-2008
10 Top Design Skills
for Tough Times
(source: Electronic Design) | According to one man's opinion, these are the most desirable skills to possess in order to be competitive in these tough time. In order: | #1 | Analog Design | | #2 | Radiation Hardening | | #3 | Programming | | #4 | RF ¬ ¬ | | #5 | Optics | | #6 | DSP | | #7 | Emerging Power Tech | | #8 | Quantum Physics | | #9 | Nanotechnology | | #10 | Mechanical Design |
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11-2-2008 | TIME's Best Inventions
of 2008
(source: TIMES) | TIME just published their opinion of the 50 best inventions. Here are the top 10 of those. | 1 | OTC DNA Test | | 2 | Tesla Roadster | | 3 | Lunar Recon Orbiter | | 4 | Hulu.com | | 5 | Large Hadron Collider | | 6 | Global Seed Vault | | 7 | Chevy Volt | | 8 | Bullets That Shoot Bullets | | 9 | Orbital Internet | | 10 | Roadrunner Supercomputer |
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11-13-2008 2008 Electronic Design Salary Survey
(source: Electronic Design) | ED just released its 2008 results based on nearly 3,000 responses. Here are numbers by age for total compensation.| ≤24 | $54,989 | | 25-29 | $73,445 | | 30-34 | $84,917 | | 35-39 | $93,666 | | 40-44 | $108,594 | | 45-49 | $109,218 | | 50-54* | $117,768 | | 55-59 | $114,739 | | ≥60 | $108,544 |
| | * This is my age group. Boy am I ever pulling the average down! My apologies. |
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11-6-2008 |
Kirt
Blattenberger
Carpe Diem!