Build Your Own Free-to-Air (FTA) Satellite TV System


Book Description

LEGALLY TAP INTO ABSOLUTELY FREE SATELLITE TV! Replace or expand your paid TV services with Free-to-Air television programming with ease. Build Your Own Free-to-Air (FTA) Satellite TV System shows how to affordably put together your own subscription-free home entertainment center from start to finish. Find out how to choose the right components, set up a satellite dish and receiver, fine-tune reception, add local over-the-air stations, and go mobile with your FTA TV system. You'll get full details on recording to the latest digital devices, installing a TV card in your PC, viewing video over the Internet, and integrating theater-quality audio. Photos and diagrams illustrate each step along the way. Comprehensive lists of technical terms and definitions, available channels and satellites, and dish-aiming steps are also included in this practical guide. COVERAGE INCLUDES: Equipment, component, and tool selection Satellite dish and FTA receiver installation Stereo, 5.1, and 7.1 sound Dish alignment and synchronization Local over-the-air channel reception Video over the Internet and movies on demand DVD players, DVRs, PCs, and VCRs Mobile, RV, and remote Free-to-Air TV




Build Your Own Free-to-Air (FTA) Satellite TV System


Book Description

LEGALLY TAP INTO ABSOLUTELY FREE SATELLITE TV! Replace or expand your paid TV services with Free-to-Air television programming with ease. Build Your Own Free-to-Air (FTA) Satellite TV System shows how to affordably put together your own subscription-free home entertainment center from start to finish. Find out how to choose the right components, set up a satellite dish and receiver, fine-tune reception, add local over-the-air stations, and go mobile with your FTA TV system. You'll get full details on recording to the latest digital devices, installing a TV card in your PC, viewing video over the Internet, and integrating theater-quality audio. Photos and diagrams illustrate each step along the way. Comprehensive lists of technical terms and definitions, available channels and satellites, and dish-aiming steps are also included in this practical guide. COVERAGE INCLUDES: Equipment, component, and tool selection Satellite dish and FTA receiver installation Stereo, 5.1, and 7.1 sound Dish alignment and synchronization Local over-the-air channel reception Video over the Internet and movies on demand DVD players, DVRs, PCs, and VCRs Mobile, RV, and remote Free-to-Air TV




DIY Satellite Platforms


Book Description

"Can any hobbyist build a satellite? Our DIY guide steps you through designing and building a base picosatellite platform tough enough to withstand launch and survive in orbit. If you have basic maker skills, you can build a space-ready solar-powered computer-controlled assembly suitable for attaching instruments and rocketing into space." [résumé éditeur].




Engineering a Safer World


Book Description

A new approach to safety, based on systems thinking, that is more effective, less costly, and easier to use than current techniques. Engineering has experienced a technological revolution, but the basic engineering techniques applied in safety and reliability engineering, created in a simpler, analog world, have changed very little over the years. In this groundbreaking book, Nancy Leveson proposes a new approach to safety—more suited to today's complex, sociotechnical, software-intensive world—based on modern systems thinking and systems theory. Revisiting and updating ideas pioneered by 1950s aerospace engineers in their System Safety concept, and testing her new model extensively on real-world examples, Leveson has created a new approach to safety that is more effective, less expensive, and easier to use than current techniques. Arguing that traditional models of causality are inadequate, Leveson presents a new, extended model of causation (Systems-Theoretic Accident Model and Processes, or STAMP), then shows how the new model can be used to create techniques for system safety engineering, including accident analysis, hazard analysis, system design, safety in operations, and management of safety-critical systems. She applies the new techniques to real-world events including the friendly-fire loss of a U.S. Blackhawk helicopter in the first Gulf War; the Vioxx recall; the U.S. Navy SUBSAFE program; and the bacterial contamination of a public water supply in a Canadian town. Leveson's approach is relevant even beyond safety engineering, offering techniques for “reengineering” any large sociotechnical system to improve safety and manage risk.




Surviving Orbit the DIY Way


Book Description

Is your picosatellite ready for launch? Can it withstand rocket thrusts and the vacuum of space? This do-it-yourself guide helps you conduct a series of hands-on tests designed to check your satellite’s readiness. Learn precisely what the craft and its electronic components must endure if they’re to function properly in Low Earth Orbit. The perfect follow-up to DIY Satellite Platforms (our primer for designing and building a picosatellite), this book also provides an overview of what space is like and how orbits work, enabling you to set up the launch and orbit support you’ll need. Go deep into the numbers that describe conditions your satellite will face Learn how to mitigate the risks of radiation in the ionosphere Pick up enough formal systems engineering to understand what the tests are all about Build a thermal vacuum chamber for mimicking environment of space Simulate the rocket launch by building and running a vibration shake test Use a homebuilt centrifuge to conduct high G-force tests Get guidelines on scheduling tests and choosing an appropriate lab or clean room




Working Effectively with Legacy Code


Book Description

Get more out of your legacy systems: more performance, functionality, reliability, and manageability Is your code easy to change? Can you get nearly instantaneous feedback when you do change it? Do you understand it? If the answer to any of these questions is no, you have legacy code, and it is draining time and money away from your development efforts. In this book, Michael Feathers offers start-to-finish strategies for working more effectively with large, untested legacy code bases. This book draws on material Michael created for his renowned Object Mentor seminars: techniques Michael has used in mentoring to help hundreds of developers, technical managers, and testers bring their legacy systems under control. The topics covered include Understanding the mechanics of software change: adding features, fixing bugs, improving design, optimizing performance Getting legacy code into a test harness Writing tests that protect you against introducing new problems Techniques that can be used with any language or platform—with examples in Java, C++, C, and C# Accurately identifying where code changes need to be made Coping with legacy systems that aren't object-oriented Handling applications that don't seem to have any structure This book also includes a catalog of twenty-four dependency-breaking techniques that help you work with program elements in isolation and make safer changes.




Home Automation Made Easy


Book Description

"Make your home smarter, safer, and more fun--and save money, too! Home automation is finally practical, useful, and easy! Now, you can control your home exactly the way you want to, without paying monthly fees. This book shows how to do it all yourself, with today's simpler, more reliable, less expensive technologies."--From publisher.




Home Automation Made Easy


Book Description

Absolutely no experience needed! Make your home smarter, safer, and more fun—and save money, too! Home automation is finally practical, useful, and easy! Now, you can control your home exactly the way you want to, without paying monthly fees. This book shows how to do it all yourself, with today’s simpler, more reliable, less expensive technologies. Dennis C. Brewer first makes sure you’re comfortable with wiring basics and safety, and then guides you through installing, setting up, and using today’s best home automation software. Next, he walks you through several great DIY projects you can complete in just hours. Before you know it, you’ll be controlling appliances, lighting, devices, home security, energy consumption, heating/cooling, and even your home entertainment center. Brewer covers phone interfaces, opportunities to expand, and even offerings from your phone and Internet service providers. When it comes to home automation, the future is here—and it works! · Pick the right products and services, without overspending · Control your home from anywhere, with Android, iPhone, iPad, or your computer · Go green, save energy, all year long · Make your home safer, more secure, and more comfortable · Overcome personal mobility challenges · Get more fun out of your TV and music system




The Handbook of Lithium-Ion Battery Pack Design


Book Description

The Handbook of Lithium-Ion Battery Pack Design: Chemistry, Components, Types and Terminology,?Second Edition provides a clear and concise explanation of EV and Li-ion batteries for readers that are new to the field. The second edition expands and updates all topics covered in the original book, adding more details to all existing chapters and including major updates to align with all of the rapid changes the industry has experienced over the past few years. This handbook offers a layman’s explanation of the history of vehicle electrification and battery technology, describing the various terminology and acronyms and explaining how to do simple calculations that can be used in determining basic battery sizing, capacity, voltage, and energy. By the end of this book the reader will have a solid understanding of the terminology around Li-ion batteries and be able to undertake simple battery calculations. The book is immensely useful to beginning and experienced engineers alike who are moving into the battery field. Li-ion batteries are one of the most unique systems in automobiles today in that they combine multiple engineering disciplines, yet most engineering programs focus on only a single engineering field. This book provides the reader with a reference to the history, terminology and design criteria needed to understand the Li-ion battery and to successfully lay out a new battery concept. Whether you are an electrical engineer, a mechanical engineer or a chemist, this book will help you better appreciate the inter-relationships between the various battery engineering fields that are required to understand the battery as an Energy Storage System. It gives great insights for readers ranging from engineers to sales, marketing, management, leadership, investors, and government officials. Adds a brief history of battery technology and its evolution to current technologies? Expands and updates the chemistry to include the latest types Discusses thermal runaway and cascading failure mitigation technologies? Expands and updates the descriptions of the battery module and pack components and systems?? Adds description of the manufacturing processes for cells, modules, and packs? Introduces and discusses new topics such as battery-as-a-service, cell to pack and cell to chassis designs, and wireless BMS?