“There are no electrons”
Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
21–30 of 65 posts
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#22Here's a good reading about problems with teaching electricity: "Why Electricity is hard to understand?" http://amasci.com/miscon/whyhrd3.html
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#23"Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz [0]. Not only does it have practical circuits it also has chapters on theory presented in such a way as to have me understand it. I think many of the books I read in the past shied away from complex math, linear algebra, etc. whereas PEfI uses them as needed. "The Art of Electronics", for example, I found to be absolutely abysmal. It's not an in depth book, it's pr…
I would stay away from practical electronics for inventors. The book historically was chock full of really bad explanations and mistakes which brings into question the author’s knowledge and credentials. You don’t see that until you look at it from the professional side of things. To a new electronics person it looks credible. I can’t speak for later editions.
The Art of Electronics is an excellent book but misunderstood. It’s a reference book not an introductory text. It should be used in a professional capacity or be read alongside the accompanying student manual.
The book situation in this sector is pretty horrible unfortunately. The old NEETs stuff is verbose but teaches you nothing, the Make books teach you what but not how. Same with the Forest Mims books.
I have been considering writing a book which covers enough electronics for people to competently solve a problem they have without being led up the wrong path or delve too heavily into mathematics (the latter is unfortunately mostly unavoidable but basic algebra should be enough to solve nearly all problems)
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#24I like All About Circuits: https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/textbook/
I've seen this site before, it looks really good but is there a downloadable/PDF version?
The entire content from this was open source and they built a community and advertising network around it and slowly devalued the content. I’m not sure what they did license wise with the original.
The original source material is out there still but I can’t remember what it is called or where it is.
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#25Getting Started in Electronics by Forrest M. Mims III It makes basic electronics very intuitive.
I think in late high school, or maybe even after I started my electrical engineering degree, I bought a few of his books from Tandy (the Radio Shack brand here in Australia). They were a great way to get enthused about electronics and encouraged me to build and get hands-on (which is obviously what Tandy wanted to achieve)
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#26Decades ago, like in the 1950's perhaps, the US Navy created a training manual about electricity and electronics for its personnel (a reasonable facsimile of laymen). This was used as the basis for a book called Basic Electricity . 1970: https://www.amazon.ca/Basic-Electricity-Bureau-Naval-Personn... 2002: https://www.amazon.ca/Handbook-Basic-Electricity-Naval-Perso... 2020: https://www.amazon.ca/Basic-Electricity-Bu…
I love that it’s just called “Basic Electricity”
Not electrical engineering, not electronics. Let us scare nobody off with the cover.
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#27"Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz [0]. Not only does it have practical circuits it also has chapters on theory presented in such a way as to have me understand it. I think many of the books I read in the past shied away from complex math, linear algebra, etc. whereas PEfI uses them as needed. "The Art of Electronics", for example, I found to be absolutely abysmal. It's not an in depth book, it's pr…
> "The Art of Electronics", for example, I found to be absolutely abysmal.
Agreed. I had this damn thing collecting dust on my coffee table until someone expressed interest and took it off my hands.
I'll check out the PEfI book. I don't consider myself a total noob, but I'd also fail the first week's exam in any EE intro course.
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#28"Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz [0]. Not only does it have practical circuits it also has chapters on theory presented in such a way as to have me understand it. I think many of the books I read in the past shied away from complex math, linear algebra, etc. whereas PEfI uses them as needed. "The Art of Electronics", for example, I found to be absolutely abysmal. It's not an in depth book, it's pr…
I would stay away from practical electronics for inventors. The book historically was chock full of really bad explanations and mistakes which brings into question the author’s knowledge and credentials. You don’t see that until you look at it from the professional side of things. To a new electronics person it looks credible. I can’t speak for later editions. The Art of Electronics is an excellent book but misunders…
I for one would be very interested.
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#29"Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz [0]. Not only does it have practical circuits it also has chapters on theory presented in such a way as to have me understand it. I think many of the books I read in the past shied away from complex math, linear algebra, etc. whereas PEfI uses them as needed. "The Art of Electronics", for example, I found to be absolutely abysmal. It's not an in depth book, it's pr…
I would stay away from practical electronics for inventors. The book historically was chock full of really bad explanations and mistakes which brings into question the author’s knowledge and credentials. You don’t see that until you look at it from the professional side of things. To a new electronics person it looks credible. I can’t speak for later editions. The Art of Electronics is an excellent book but misunders…
Can you give some examples of the mistakes?
Re: Ask HN: Best Layman's Book on Electricity
#30If you're interested in digital electronics (e.g. computers), I strongly recommend "Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software"[0].
It's a bit of a history book on the invention of computers, starting from the telegram. By the end of the book, you should know enough to create a computer from wires and a power source alone. The section on the physics of electricity is only a few pages though.
Personally, for a more high level and intuitive understanding of electrical concepts, I generally find educational YouTube videos more effective than books. I strongly recommend "The Engineering Mindset" channel on YouTube[1] but there are many others.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code:_The_Hidden_Language_of_C...