Understanding Abstraction is Very Helpful in Electronics and

Youtube should have different search algorithms for education and entertainment.

📝 Summary::

Introduction and Topic
📆 00:00:00 The video introduces the topic of 'abstraction' and its influence on electronics projects, with a focus on career planning.
🎤 00:00:11 The topic of 'abstraction' is chosen for its universal relevance and its impact on career decisions.
💬 00:00:24 The host introduces the video with a greeting and a brief overview of the content.

Understanding Abstraction
⬆️ 00:00:57 Abstraction is defined as moving up to a higher level by understanding and simplifying the lower level.
❓ 00:01:09 The question of whether understanding 'basics' like transistors and assembly language is necessary for success in engineering or programming is raised.
🔥 00:01:34 The concept of expertise is discussed, comparing the Stone Age definition to modern expertise.
▶️ 00:01:58 The 'abstraction ladder' is introduced, representing the different levels of knowledge and expertise.
🧰 00:02:11 The idea that experts are 'abstracted' into their tools and knowledge, freeing them from needing to care about lower levels, is explained.

Evolution of Electronics Projects
💻 00:03:14 The evolution of electronics projects through different abstraction levels is outlined, from resistors and transistors to highly integrated chips and software advancements.
🔗 00:03:59 The role of modules as 'glue' between abstraction levels and their anticipation of the next level is highlighted.
▶️ 00:04:31 Five trends that led to a new rung on the electronics abstraction ladder are discussed, including the introduction of cheap microcontrollers, the Arduino ecosystem, Chinese manufacturing, AliExpress, and YouTube as a learning platform.

Advancements in Electronics Projects
✨ 00:05:31 Advancements in electronics projects are described, such as the integration of services from other devices and the internet, leading to larger projects with more available memory and GPIO pins.
🔧 00:07:18 The transition from programming-intensive projects to simplified project configuration using modules and standardized hardware is explained.
▶️ 00:08:51 The introduction of the Raspberry Pi and Linux as a new level of abstraction, integrating previous levels and enabling new project possibilities, is discussed.

Impact on Content Creation
📺 00:11:38 The emergence of new YouTube channels focused on higher-level projects and technical sensations is noted, indicating a shift in content creation trends.
▶️ 00:12:25 The impact of higher-level content creation on existing channels and tech companies, leading to a shift in competition for attention, is highlighted.
▶️ 00:12:50 The 'Homelab' concept, combining existing knowledge with virtualization and networking, is presented as the next level in the abstraction ladder for the host.

Channel Direction and Community Engagement
⬆️ 00:13:55 The host's decision to maintain a multi-rung electronics channel, reflecting both upper and lower levels of expertise, is explained.
🧭 00:14:43 The host's commitment to providing diverse content, including topics like USB-C functionality, GPS precision positioning, and cellular modems, is emphasized.
🧠 00:15:43 Encouragement for knowledge sharing between generations and the importance of helping and learning from each other are highlighted as key principles of the channel.

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🔑 Key takeaways::

Abstraction Concept
⬆️ 00:00:57 Abstraction is defined as moving up to a higher level by understanding and simplifying the lower level. It forms the 'abstraction ladder' that represents different levels of knowledge and expertise.
🧰 00:02:11 Experts are 'abstracted' into their tools and knowledge, freeing them from needing to care about lower levels. This concept allows for specialization at higher levels without requiring in-depth knowledge of lower levels.

Evolution of Electronics Projects
💻 00:03:14 The evolution of electronics projects through different abstraction levels, from resistors and transistors to highly integrated chips and software advancements, has driven down costs, space, and power requirements while increasing quality.
▶️ 00:04:31 Five trends led to a new rung on the electronics abstraction ladder, making it easier and cheaper than ever to get into electronics and computing. These trends include the introduction of cheap microcontrollers, the Arduino ecosystem, Chinese manufacturing, AliExpress, and YouTube as a learning platform.

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Summarized by TubeSum Chrome Extension

A few thoughts about your thesis.

Keep the "low level" alive. In a flash of EMP, we could be knocked back into the stone age and all the basics will be needed once more.

Sure, you may not need to make the ingredients to bake the cake. As you say, knowing their properties allows creative and useful variation. Buy what happens when it will no longer be manufactured (in cheap/slave labor) CHINA, and the method of doing so is lost in a patent office, or dies with its creator. What then?

Back in school days a pretty lass brought a broken transistor radio to class and asked the brightest boy in the room to fix it. He brought out his slide rule, puzzled over theory, and eventually gave up. Quietly, I took the radio aside and quickly discovered a loose solder joint. Repaired, while Mr. Formula stumbled on in puzzlement. So there are fundamentals we best not lose touch with.

Oh, I did not win the heart of the pretty lass. Nerds finish last.

Brilliant and very true… This is the connection energy this world needs more than ever… Up to the next layer…

This video describes the abstraction layers really good. I'm working on an Open source project that is about reusing Old ePaper price labels of shops. Most of the new people join are mostly just want a display to display information from home assistant or other systems, and that is fine. But if you dive in, the project has 2 ESP firmware(S3 and C6), firmware for multiple different MCUs(ZBS, NRF…), a lot of frontend work, a CI pipeline, a HA integration, web flasher… And it fun to dive in deeper but also to just use the project to create useful displays.

Once again, Andreas, wise words. Your outlook on everything and the way you parse it are one of the few things that keep me on this platform for topics other than history or listening to "The Idiot" audiobook when struggling to sleep as I'm more apt to read a text book now when I have a project idea bouncing about in my add-adled and always contradictory mind. I am a high functioning, middle aged man with mental ilness and tend to have controversial opinions but they come from a place of appreciation for people like you and wanting better for the younger generation. Thank you.

Thank you, Sir.

Regarding “homelab”. I would not call this an absolutely new trend. That what personal computing and networking enthusiasts were doing for years. Sure they started from higher abstraction layers and don’t have embedded systems perspective as we do, but still. Also microcontroller enthusiasts did in the 2000s the same things as personal computer enthusiasts in early 1980s. I think there are several abstraction ladders are existing in the same time. Each has own height, but also own flavor and tooling.

It takes some effort to be able to take a step back from the present and be able to have a look at the bigger picture. Your video is an amazing eye opening opportunity for us who were too busy or lazy to take that step back. Amazing video. I look forward to watching your new projects this year. Thanks a lot for the hard work making sure we, the students, can take away knowledge from your. It is hard to get to know something, but your have an amazing talent to pass on that knowledge to the rest, thanks so much.

Half a million followers soon!!!! Congratulations ! Especially for an électronics chanel… Very proud of you

Congratulations on your success, you came a long way from 10k subscribers when I joined the channel.

As someone who is 100% software oriented professionally and only do electronics at hobby level, the same thing is true for software, however it is important to understand that a lot of times we are talking about different tools with different limitations. Abstractions introduce limitations by their design and in specific cases this is not acceptable. We still are using widely low-level languages like C in the industry, and these kind of languages will never go away.

I think same can be said about electronics. I designed some simple electronics for a project where we needed to integrate with a RS-232 interface from a smartphone. In that case using a microcontroller with BT capabilities was the best approach, as the cost per unit was very low, using a RPI or something higher-level would not make much sense in that case, even if creating an integration is times more easier.

👏👏👏

Abstraction is ' lies for children ', it may not be the deepest truth but it works and alows you to see the bigest pictures and then go further.

Tbh , this entire electronics/programming was the best community i got myself into. Lots of knowledge freely available and anything felt possible without breaking a buck. Always felt so nice to do stuff normal people found incredibly cool for just 10 20 bucks

Yes, assembly and other low levels help understand abstractions.
If you don't appreciate what is happening under the hood you will never get good performance.
I see a lot of failed products because of this.

The problem with not understanding the lower levels is that you're at the mercy of whatever abstractions are made available to you. What happens when you need a new abstraction … or need to tweak the existing one? The people who can write the assembly language to interface with the low level transistors and provide an abstracted interface for other developers, are underrated.

Thank you. There was a general worrying mood that I need to re-learn all the small systems to be able to say that now I understand somethig, but sometimes it is impossible because it is too much knowledge.

Not old, but wise!

And even more so, in sharing your wisdom with all of us, it helps advance the next rung on the ladder that much more quickly.

Looking forward to your videos this year, as always!

You make me feel old… I started by designing with vacuum tubes. :-> They are a lot like a FET with thermal activation and a very high on resistance.