For the past year we have been getting emails from users asking us to add parametric search to Octopart. We told you we were working on it and you probably thought we were working on our sun tans. To all of those users thanks for being so patient. We're finally releasing parametric search today!
Have you ever wanted to use Octopart to sort capacitors by their capacitance? Or to look for resistors with a power rating greater than 50W? Well, now you can. Whenever you see a numeric filter just click on it and a slider will pop up to help you set the range. For advanced users, you should try playing around with the url to refine your search even further.
OK, let's not get too excited. We realize that the features we're releasing today aren't perfect. However, we thought some people might find them useful so we wanted to release them as soon as possible. Now we're going to go back to work trying to make parametric search better so please email us with comments and suggestions (contact@octopart.com).
A few weeks ago, Andres, Harish and I had lunch with the guys behind Reddit. Reddit is a social news site with a huge community spread across many topic specific sub-reddits. Users submit interesting links and vote on which links should rise to the top. The links are always changing depending on the vote totals - right now the top story on the technology sub-reddit is on highly efficient inflatable electric cars.
Take a look at the gadgets and technology sub-reddits - there are lots of cool links being posted there all the time. You'll also see this ad for Octopart there once in a while to let redditors know about Octopart. Welcome redditors!
I have trouble keeping parts in my workspace in order, but keeping track of tens of thousands of different parts in a giant warehouse is another story altogether. Phil explained the two main ways to organize a warehouse: alphabetically by manufacturer and a scheme where identical parts are binned together and placed in a random shelf location. A big computer database keeps track of where everything lives. Brill is moving towards the random scheme because it makes adding new parts much easier.
Rather than trying to squeeze a box in-between two other boxes, you just find some open shelf space, put the box there and tell computer the location. Another advantage is that the computer can tell the "part picker" the shortest path to take as they collect the parts for an order. Just make sure you have a backup copy of the database!
Seeing the inner workings of a distributor's warehouse in action was great for us - it's easy to forget that the parts on Octopart are not just rows in a database. Thanks Phil!
In 2001 I was an EECS major at Berkeley, and I was trying to put together something cute for my girlfriend. The idea was that I'd click a button on an X10 remote control, and a bunch of candles would light up-it would be dorky, possibly romantic, but mostly just a fun project. The only problem was my focus on the software side of my major rather than on EE, so I was left with about 110 volts AC and only the crudest ideas about how to light something on fire.
I went to the hardware store on University looking for a likely piece of candle-lighting handiness, but came up short. I finally tried to talk to a salesperson about my project, but given the national climate at the time (a few months after September 11th) I had a hard time explaining that (a) I was not a terrorist and (b) I did, in fact, have a girlfriend, despite a slightly skewed idea of what might constitute romance. I left the store with thirty feet of insulated copper wire and a few suspicious looks.
The final product was the wire connected in series with a short segment of steel wool filament (the "resistor") which was wrapped around the wick of the candle (and the whole resistor was dusted liberally with powdered match heads). I think I had about three or four candles in the series.
And the whole thing worked! Mostly. About half the time I could get it to light on cue. About 30% of the time, I'd trip the circuit breaker and my whole apartment would go dark. And the remaining 20% of the time the filament would sort of explode, throwing small threads of molten steel around the room and in one case into the skin of my elbow (the scar is fading).
In the end I decided I couldn't rely on the mechanism to stand on its own, but I wanted to show my girlfriend anyway-I wrapped us both up in a down comforter (fire retardant), put a clear glass punch bowl in front of her face (I had racquetball goggles for myself) and pressed the button-I think one candle lit, and then the rest of the resistors blew in a nice little shower of sparks. My girlfriend removed the bowl from her face, turned to me with a smile and asked, "And how much time did you spend on this?"
RSS feed