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Re: fast divider?

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On 2/04/2026 3:12 am, john larkin wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Apr 2026 02:13:38 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
> wrote:
>> On 1/04/2026 7:06 pm, john larkin wrote:
>>> On Wed, 1 Apr 2026 15:54:44 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>> wrote:
>>>> On 1/04/2026 2:14 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>> On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 22:30:44 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>> On 31/03/2026 8:40 pm, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>> On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 16:35:49 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>> On 31/03/2026 2:00 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 16:42:12 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>> On 30/03/2026 2:18 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> On Sun, 29 Mar 2026 15:52:53 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>> On 29/03/2026 8:38 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Sat, 28 Mar 2026 16:44:40 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On 28/03/2026 5:39 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Sun, 22 Mar 2026 03:00:16 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On 22/03/2026 1:52 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Sat, 21 Mar 2026 16:36:43 +1100, Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On 20/03/2026 4:05 am, john larkin wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Tue, 17 Mar 2026 22:30:01 +0000, someone
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> <cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

<snip>

>>> Invention is precisely running into - running toward - the unexpected.
>>
>> That's a bizarre way of looking at it. It's doing something in a way
>> that hasn't been done before, but it is goal directed, and you wouldn't
>> start the process if you didn't have a pretty clear idea of what you
>> wanted to do, if not exactly how you were going to do it.
> 
> I strongly disagree; that is backwards. Sometimes we imagine products
> or circuits that nobody ever wanted or expected. It just happens
> sometimes at 2AM.

And very few of them look sensible after the sun has come up.
> 
> I have a folder full of ideas, most speculative and unexpected and
> probably dumb. 

If you knew a bit more, it would be a much thinner folder.

> We hire smart kids, college students, to explore them
> and write up a report on the possible uses, competitors specs and
> pricing, any interesting offshoots that occur to them. They get a
> fixed fee when they turn in the report.

An expensive self-indulgence.

>>> Sometimes that's accidental, but can be deliberately provoked.
>>> Inventing needs the right skills and personality but improves with
>>> practice in the right environment. Books have been written about that.
> >
>> None of them useful enough to have been touted at places that encouraged
>> inventions and applying for patents. EMI Central Research was just such
>> a place, and I worked there for three years without ever running into
>> such a book. The histories of Bell Labs
>>
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Idea_Factory
>>
> 
> I have that one; good book.
>
> Someone said that all the great inventions at Bell in those days were
> done by people who ate lunch with Harry Nyquist.
> 
>> didn't mention any such book either. People will write books with the
>> flimsiest of justifications if they think the product will sell.
>> Teaching people how to make genuine inventions would be a very good
>> thing if you could do it, and a lot of confidence tricksters claim that
>> they can. The evidence supporting such claims doesn't seem to exist.
> 
> The real evidence is purchase orders.

People don't give you purchase orders for patents. They buy products.
A good and patentable idea can be central to a product, but inept 
development can wreck the best of ideas. The Lintech electron beam 
tester was based on a patented idea of their boss, whose name was on the 
patent (which he'd got to own). He cheap-skated on the development to 
such an extent that one of his ex-engineers was able to build a pretty 
much identical machine which destroyed his business - nobody ordered a 
Lintech machine after the Schlumberger competitor hit the market, and 
after Lintech had delivered the last of the machine it had sold they 
went bankrupt. Mike Engelhart  - of LTSpice fame - worked on that project.

>>> Some people invent things. Some intelligent and (over)educated people
>>> actively resent invention, because they can't do it.
>>
>> I can't say that I've met any of them. My father and two of my friends
>> have each got their names onto about 25 patents and none of them ever
>> talked about people resenting that work.
>>
>>>>> Given an enormous space of undiscovered ideas, one profits from a
>>>>> method of exploring them in parallel with minimal filtering.
>>
>> At EMI Central Research we were encourage to submit patent queries. One
>> of my colleagues put in a record number of patent queries - about fifty
>> in one year - and was seen as having rather poor judgement. None of them
>> turned into a patent. He would have benefited from better filtering.
> 
> The real evidence is purchase orders.

It seems to be the only evidence you can understand. You seem to have 
got your name on exactly one patent, taken out by a group you were 
working with, so your grasp of what constitutes a patentable idea and 
what you can do with it does seem to be second hand.

-- 
Bill Sloman, Sydney

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Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-27 11:39 -0700
  Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-03-28 16:44 +1100
    Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-28 14:38 -0700
      Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-03-29 15:52 +1100
        Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-29 08:18 -0700
          Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-03-30 16:42 +1100
            Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-30 08:00 -0700
              Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-03-31 16:35 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-31 02:40 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-03-31 22:30 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-31 08:14 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Buzz McCool <buzz_mccool@yahoo.com> - 2026-03-31 10:41 -0700
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-31 10:57 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Ross Finlayson <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> - 2026-03-31 14:25 -0700
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-03-31 15:16 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-01 16:17 +1100
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-01 16:05 +1100
                Re: fast divider? Ross Finlayson <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> - 2026-04-01 02:04 -0700
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-01 07:25 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2026-04-01 16:07 +0000
                Re: fast divider? Ross Finlayson <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> - 2026-04-01 09:37 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-01 15:54 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-01 01:06 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-02 02:13 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-01 09:12 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-02 14:41 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-02 07:53 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-03 02:21 +1100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-02 08:57 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-04-03 04:05 +1100
                Re: fast divider? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2026-04-02 13:17 -0400
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-02 11:20 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2026-04-09 10:55 -0400
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-09 10:34 -0700
                Re: fast divider? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2026-04-09 13:43 -0400
                Re: fast divider? John R Walliker <jrwalliker@gmail.com> - 2026-04-09 19:07 +0100
                Re: fast divider? john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> - 2026-04-09 13:47 -0700

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