Two playboys

I have two good friends. They are both very smart and charming. They also have one common point, both have many girlfriends before. I think I need both hands and foots to count all the gfs I know about from them. So I often joke to them they are playboys.

Let's call them Mr. W and Mr. O.

Mr. W is my high school pal. He was the best computer genius in our high school. We came to US to study but in different colleges. We often chatted on the phone and visited each other. Mr. O is my college pal. He was also my roommate and business adventure partner. I met many of his girlfriends before. All of them were movie-star pretty, seriously.

These two guys changes gfs so often, so my first greeting to them was often this: having a new date recently? But last month, to my surprise, both of them told me they were getting married. I am glad that they finally settle down.

Mr. W is in UK and Mr. O is in NYC now. We didn't keep in touch as often. I just want to let them know I am very happy for them about their marriage. And I missed all the fun time we had together.

Self Study: System on Chip

System on Chip(SoC) is a popular topic in chip design nowadays. SoC means combining digital and analog system on a single chip. Circuits used to build on a large board, now it can be packed on a tiny chip. The outcome, small multi-function devices such as cell phone and iPod.

Digital and analog system are often design separately. For digital system (e.g. CPU), CMOS technology is the favorite choice because it is cheap and consumes little power. For analog system (e.g. amplifiers, radio receivers), BJT, SiGe or GaAs technology are often employed because they have much better performance. CMOS, BJT, SiGe, GaAs are different semiconductor. Usually they can't be combined together so they are built separately.

As CPU becomes so popular, CMOS is now the dominate main-stream semiconductor. To reduce cost, companies are demanding designers to build both digital and analog system using only CMOS. Unfortunately, CMOS semiconductor naturally has weak analog performance. But the demand is there and money make people think. Designers gradually come up new ideas to build good analog circuits using CMOS. As a result people know better on packing both digital and analog system on a single chip based on CMOS. Maturity of SoC design should bring more creative portable electronics to the market.

Snap Shot : Snow Peak

The 1st time I see snow for the seven years living in the Bay Area ...

Snow on Mission Peak




























The two palm trees nearby my home

Snap Shot : 夢 の Art Work

Wife having fun on making these ...

Three years of waiting

Is there anything you want to get an answer. But there is nothing you can do, except waiting. I have been waiting for something for three years. Last Tuesday, the waiting is over. My 1st ever US patent was granted. It was filed on April 2003.

As a tech guy, I always want to invent something. But honestly I don't have enough talent to innovate anything significant alone. I were fortunate to join an interesting research project. And unexpectedly, the research results had enough commercial value to make it a product. So the company filed a patent for protection. It was a rare opportunity and a nice experience for me.

Another topic, I realize my blog didn't talk about any tech stuff for nearly three months. I talked too much about personal this and that. It is drifting away from my original theme "Tech Life in the Valley". So starting next week I will post more self-study technical topics. I find by writing technical stuff into an easy-to-read style, it helps me to understand it better too. Hopefully someone will find those blogs worth killing time.

Dream Job II

Not sure if this is just me, most of the cartoon character I draw has a name. Each character has its personality, follow with some story. This weird habit began since I were very little. I don't like to repeat the character's personality and its stroy. So every time I try to come up something different. Slowly I ran out of idea on cartoon character. At 25 year old, I even lost interest on the story of Kung Fu comic. So as my drawing skill stalled.

But then I developed a new hobby. I started to write. My English grammar was poor, so I write in Chinese. I don't know how to type Chinese so I can only write on paper. I had written several short stories for fun. There was one problem. I had no reader. So my wife was victimized to be my reader. She sometimes gave positive comments on my stories. She also correct my typo with a pen... like a teacher.

So I conclude my dream job is actually a fiction writer. In fact I have a Love Story in mind that I want to write seriously. It is based on real-life story of my far relatives, a respectful old couples. I have some compelling ideas but not yet able connecting the piece into a story. Plus I need to do more research on the society background of their age. So, this writing project will be on hold ... ... for a loooong time.

Better you go, better be friends
(1st ever English story. Very silly, I've warned you)