The Making of an Expert Engineer

The Making of an Expert Engineer

Author: James Trevelyan

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2014-09-22

Total Pages: 614

ISBN-13: 1138026921

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This book sets out the principles of engineering practice, knowledge that has come to light through more than a decade of research by the author and his students studying engineers at work. Until now, this knowledge has been almost entirely unwritten, passed on invisibly from one generation of engineers to the next, what engineers refer to as “experience”. This is a book for all engineers. It distils the knowledge of many experts in one volume. The book will help engineers enjoy a more satisfying and rewarding career and provide more valuable results for their employers and clients. The book focuses on issues often seen as “non-technical” in the world of engineering, yet it shows how these issues are thoroughly technical. Engineering firms traditionally have sought expert advice on these aspects from management schools, often regarding these aspects of engineering practice as something to do with psychology or organisational behaviour. The results are normally disappointing because management schools and psychologists have limited insight and understanding of the technical dimensions in engineering work. Little if any of the material in this book can be obtained from management texts or courses. Management schools have avoided the technical dimension of workplace practices and that is precisely what characterises engineering practice. The technical dimension infuses almost every aspect of an engineer’s working day and cannot be avoided. That’s why this book is so necessary: there has not yet been any authoritative source or guidance to bridge the gap between inanimate technical issues and organisational behaviour. This book fills this gap in our knowledge, is based on rigorous research, and yet is written in a style which is accessible for a wide audience.


From Engineer to Manager: Mastering the Transition, Second Edition

From Engineer to Manager: Mastering the Transition, Second Edition

Author: B. Michael Aucoin

Publisher: Artech House

Published: 2018-09-30

Total Pages: 413

ISBN-13: 1630815454

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Providing clear, expert guidance to help engineers make a smooth transition to the management team, this a newly revised and updated edition of an Artech House bestseller belongs on every engineer’s reference shelf. The author’s 30-plus year perspective indicates that, while most engineers will spend the majority of their careers as managers, most are dissatisfied with the transition. Much of this frustration is the result of lack of preparation and training. This book provides a solid grounding in the critical attitudes and principles needed for success. The greatly expanded Second Edition adds critical new discussions on the development of healthy teams, meeting management, delegating, decision making, and personal branding. New managers are taught to internalize the attitudes and master the associated skills to excel in, and be satisfied with the transition to management. The book explains how to communicate more effectively and improve relationships with colleagues. Professionals learn how to use their newly acquired skills to solve immediate problems. Moreover, they are shown how to apply six fundamental principles to their on-going work with engineering teams and management. Supplemental material, such as templates, exercises, and worksheets are available at no additional cost at ArtechHouse.com.


The Audio Expert

The Audio Expert

Author: Ethan Winer

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2012-11-12

Total Pages: 672

ISBN-13: 1136126147

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The Audio Expert is a comprehensive reference that covers all aspects of audio, with many practical, as well as theoretical, explanations. Providing in-depth descriptions of how audio really works, using common sense plain-English explanations and mechanical analogies with minimal math, the book is written for people who want to understand audio at the deepest, most technical level, without needing an engineering degree. It's presented in an easy-to-read, conversational tone, and includes more than 400 figures and photos augmenting the text. The Audio Expert takes the intermediate to advanced recording engineer or audiophile and makes you an expert. The book goes far beyond merely explaining how audio "works." It brings together the concepts of audio, aural perception, musical instrument physics, acoustics, and basic electronics, showing how they're intimately related. Describing in great detail many of the practices and techniques used by recording and mixing engineers, the topics include video production and computers. Rather than merely showing how to use audio devices such as equalizers and compressors, Ethan Winer explains how they work internally, and how they are spec'd and tested. Most explanations are platform-agnostic, applying equally to Windows and Mac operating systems, and to most software and hardware. TheAudioExpertbook.com, the companion website, has audio and video examples to better present complex topics such as vibration and resonance. There are also videos demonstrating editing techniques and audio processing, as well as interviews with skilled musicians demonstrating their instruments and playing techniques.


The Essential Engineer

The Essential Engineer

Author: Henry Petroski

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2011-03-08

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0307473503

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From the acclaimed author of The Pencil and To Engineer Is Human, The Essential Engineer is an eye-opening exploration of the ways in which science and engineering must work together to address our world’s most pressing issues, from dealing with climate change and the prevention of natural disasters to the development of efficient automobiles and the search for renewable energy sources. While the scientist may identify problems, it falls to the engineer to solve them. It is the inherent practicality of engineering, which takes into account structural, economic, environmental, and other factors that science often does not consider, that makes engineering vital to answering our most urgent concerns. Henry Petroski takes us inside the research, development, and debates surrounding the most critical challenges of our time, exploring the feasibility of biofuels, the progress of battery-operated cars, and the question of nuclear power. He gives us an in-depth investigation of the various options for renewable energy—among them solar, wind, tidal, and ethanol—explaining the benefits and risks of each. Will windmills soon populate our landscape the way they did in previous centuries? Will synthetic trees, said to be more efficient at absorbing harmful carbon dioxide than real trees, soon dot our prairies? Will we construct a “sunshade” in outer space to protect ourselves from dangerous rays? In many cases, the technology already exists. What’s needed is not so much invention as engineering. Just as the great achievements of centuries past—the steamship, the airplane, the moon landing—once seemed beyond reach, the solutions to the twenty-first century’s problems await only a similar coordination of science and engineering. Eloquently reasoned and written, The Essential Engineer identifies and illuminates these problems—and, above all, sets out a course for putting ideas into action.


The Art of Doing Science and Engineering

The Art of Doing Science and Engineering

Author: Richard W. Hamming

Publisher: Stripe Press

Published: 2020-05-26

Total Pages: 327

ISBN-13: 195395331X

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A groundbreaking treatise by one of the great mathematicians of our time, who argues that highly effective thinking can be learned. What spurs on and inspires a great idea? Can we train ourselves to think in a way that will enable world-changing understandings and insights to emerge? Richard Hamming said we can, and first inspired a generation of engineers, scientists, and researchers in 1986 with "You and Your Research," an electrifying sermon on why some scientists do great work, why most don't, why he did, and why you should, too. The Art of Doing Science and Engineering is the full expression of what "You and Your Research" outlined. It's a book about thinking; more specifically, a style of thinking by which great ideas are conceived. The book is filled with stories of great people performing mighty deeds––but they are not meant to simply be admired. Instead, they are to be aspired to, learned from, and surpassed. Hamming consistently returns to Shannon’s information theory, Einstein’s relativity, Grace Hopper’s work on high-level programming, Kaiser’s work on digital fillers, and his own error-correcting codes. He also recounts a number of his spectacular failures as clear examples of what to avoid. Originally published in 1996 and adapted from a course that Hamming taught at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School, this edition includes an all-new foreword by designer, engineer, and founder of Dynamicland Bret Victor, and more than 70 redrawn graphs and charts. The Art of Doing Science and Engineering is a reminder that a childlike capacity for learning and creativity are accessible to everyone. Hamming was as much a teacher as a scientist, and having spent a lifetime forming and confirming a theory of great people, he prepares the next generation for even greater greatness.


Engineered to Speak

Engineered to Speak

Author: Alexa S. Chilcutt

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2019-08-20

Total Pages: 190

ISBN-13: 1119474965

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Engineered to Speak: Helping You Create and Deliver Engaging Technical Presentations Technical expertise alone is not enough to ensure professional success. Twenty-first century engineers and technical professionals must master making the complex simple and the simple interesting. This book helps engineers do what they love most: take a complicated system and create a stronger solution. You will learn tips and strategies that help you answer one essential question, “How can I get better at sharing my ideas with a variety of audiences?” In Engineered to Speak, Alexa Chilcutt and Adam Brooks combine their expertise in messaging and public speaking with research that illustrates how effective communication contributes to career advancement. Each chapter contains inspiring stories from practicing engineers around the world as well as useful examples, exercises and repeatable processes for creating compelling messages. This book helps technical talent become better speakers, better communicators, and ultimately better leaders. This helpful guide demystifies the art of oral communication by breaking it down into ten easy-to-follow-processes that can improve the ability of professionals at any level. By the end of Engineered to Speak, you’ll understand how to gain buy-in, identify and expand your Sphere of Influence, amplify your message, deliver compelling presentations, and learn from those who’ve embrace these skills and enjoyed professional success.


Beyond Engineering

Beyond Engineering

Author: Robert Pool

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 1997-07-17

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 0198026722

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We have long recognized technology as a driving force behind much historical and cultural change. The invention of the printing press initiated the Reformation. The development of the compass ushered in the Age of Exploration and the discovery of the New World. The cotton gin created the conditions that led to the Civil War. Now, in Beyond Engineering, science writer Robert Pool turns the question around to examine how society shapes technology. Drawing on such disparate fields as history, economics, risk analysis, management science, sociology, and psychology, Pool illuminates the complex, often fascinating interplay between machines and society, in a book that will revolutionize how we think about technology. We tend to think that reason guides technological development, that engineering expertise alone determines the final form an invention takes. But if you look closely enough at the history of any invention, says Pool, you will find that factors unrelated to engineering seem to have an almost equal impact. In his wide-ranging volume, he traces developments in nuclear energy, automobiles, light bulbs, commercial electricity, and personal computers, to reveal that the ultimate shape of a technology often has as much to do with outside and unforeseen forces. For instance, Pool explores the reasons why steam-powered cars lost out to internal combustion engines. He shows that the Stanley Steamer was in many ways superior to the Model T--it set a land speed record in 1906 of more than 127 miles per hour, it had no transmission (and no transmission headaches), and it was simpler (one Stanley engine had only twenty-two moving parts) and quieter than a gas engine--but the steamers were killed off by factors that had little or nothing to do with their engineering merits, including the Stanley twins' lack of business acumen and an outbreak of hoof-and-mouth disease. Pool illuminates other aspects of technology as well. He traces how seemingly minor decisions made early along the path of development can have profound consequences further down the road, and perhaps most important, he argues that with the increasing complexity of our technological advances--from nuclear reactors to genetic engineering--the number of things that can go wrong multiplies, making it increasingly difficult to engineer risk out of the equation. Citing such catastrophes as Bhopal, Three Mile Island, the Exxon Valdez, the Challenger, and Chernobyl, he argues that is it time to rethink our approach to technology. The days are gone when machines were solely a product of larger-than-life inventors and hard-working engineers. Increasingly, technology will be a joint effort, with its design shaped not only by engineers and executives but also psychologists, political scientists, management theorists, risk specialists, regulators and courts, and the general public. Whether discussing bovine growth hormone, molten-salt reactors, or baboon-to-human transplants, Beyond Engineering is an engaging look at modern technology and an illuminating account of how technology and the modern world shape each other.


How to Be an Engineer

How to Be an Engineer

Author: Carol Vorderman

Publisher: Dorling Kindersley Ltd

Published: 2018-05-03

Total Pages: 144

ISBN-13: 0241353300

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Learn as you do in this hands-on engineering book for kids with Carol Vorderman. Being an engineer isn't just about wearing a hard hat and looking important while holding a clipboard! It's about looking at the world and trying to figure out how it works. As well as simple engineering projects for kids to try, DK's How to be an Engineer will teach them how to think like an engineer, including materials, building, machines, getting around, and energy. You can find out how engineers use STEAM subjects and their imaginations to fix problems, and take inspiration from engineering heroes such as Leonardo da Vinci, Mae Jemison, and Elon Musk. This book encourages you to investigate, with amazing projects using things from around your home: find out about materials by crushing loo rolls, learn about jet propulsion with balloons, and build a robot arm from rulers. Fun questions, engineering experiments, and real-life scenarios come together to make engineering relevant. In How to be a Engineer the emphasis is on inspiring kids, which means less time at a computer and more time in the real world! Do you like solving problems? Are you good at making things? Have you ever dreamed of being an inventor? If so you may be an engineer in the making.


Ara the Star Engineer

Ara the Star Engineer

Author: Komal Singh

Publisher: Komal Singh

Published: 2018-10-16

Total Pages: 66

ISBN-13: 1989025196

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This is a STEM book and more! An inspiring, inclusive, whimsical way to learn about computers and technology from real-life trailblazers. Read the book, download hands-on activities, follow learning resources. Visit the website www.arastarengineer.com for more. Ara is a young girl who loves BIG numbers. She wants to count all the stars in the sky… but how? This is an upbeat adventure of Ara and her sidekick droid, DeeDee (“Beep!”). They use smarts and grit to solve a BIG problem and discover an amazing algorithm! A quest that takes them through a whirlwind of intriguing locations at Innovation Plex -- Data Centre, Ideas Lab, Coding Pods, and X-Space. Along the way, they encounter real-life women tech trailblazers of diverse backgrounds, including a Tenacious Troubleshooter, an Intrepid Innovator, a Code Commander, and a Prolific Problem Solver. They tinker-and-tailor, build-and-fail, launch-and-iterate, and in the end discover an amazing algorithm of success -- coding, courage, creativity, and collaboration (“Beeeeep!”). Ara is making a splash with industry CEOs and best-selling kids authors. “‘If she can see it, she can be it.’ With this story, girls can see leaders and be inspired to become one. A book for all ages and genders!” - Geena Davis, Founder and Chair, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media


Software Engineering at Google

Software Engineering at Google

Author: Titus Winters

Publisher: O'Reilly Media

Published: 2020-02-28

Total Pages: 602

ISBN-13: 1492082767

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Today, software engineers need to know not only how to program effectively but also how to develop proper engineering practices to make their codebase sustainable and healthy. This book emphasizes this difference between programming and software engineering. How can software engineers manage a living codebase that evolves and responds to changing requirements and demands over the length of its life? Based on their experience at Google, software engineers Titus Winters and Hyrum Wright, along with technical writer Tom Manshreck, present a candid and insightful look at how some of the world’s leading practitioners construct and maintain software. This book covers Google’s unique engineering culture, processes, and tools and how these aspects contribute to the effectiveness of an engineering organization. You’ll explore three fundamental principles that software organizations should keep in mind when designing, architecting, writing, and maintaining code: How time affects the sustainability of software and how to make your code resilient over time How scale affects the viability of software practices within an engineering organization What trade-offs a typical engineer needs to make when evaluating design and development decisions