OPINION: A life in electronics

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This, in turn, enabled me to take a combined Physics & Electronics degree at Newcastle upon Tyne Polytechnic. When I went for an interview, my first encounter with a strong Geordie accent did leave me wondering where the hell I was. The maths module had three lectures about programming in Fortran II, these were the only lessons I had in programming, but I was hooked!

After graduation, I worked on a form of audio compression called adaptive delta, pulse code modulation or ADPCM, later to be used by Microsoft and Apple.

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I was in the right place at the right time. In 1976 I built my first computer from just the information in the data sheet of the Signetics 2650 microprocessor. I got a lecturing position at Manchester Polytechnic’s Physics department, and one day I was contacted out of the blue by Mike Bibby. He had been asked to start a magazine about home computers and an ex-student had told him about me. I agreed to do four articles, convinced the magazine would not go further. Well, it did go further: 210 issues in total with my articles under the titles of ‘Body Building Course’ (BBC), and ‘Run the RISC’.

When Raspberry Pi took over the running of The MagPi magazine, I was approached to see if I could write for it. Previously I had one article published in The MagPi magazine issue #5, which made the front cover. However, ‘Mike’s Pi Bakery’ began in The MagPi issue #33, and ran all the way to issue #109.

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Having reached the grand old age of 70, I felt it was time to catch up on all those projects I had been wanting to do for years but never had the time. The first one is to convert all the Sony 8 videotapes of my children growing up into a digital format. However, I am not going for good, I expect to return for the occasional ad-hoc article.

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It has been an absolute privilege to write in The MagPi magazine, and attending various Raspberry Pi events, and shows, meeting some of my readers. Thanks for having me.

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