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“The Best Opportunities Are At The Intersection Of Industries” Shekhar Sanyal, IET (Page 95)

STARTUP INDIA

Betty—The Smart Plug (Page 72)

MARKET SURVEY

LED Lighting Industry (Page 88)

` 100

AUGUST 2017

Why Are Manufacturers Investing In 3D Printers?

FOR YOU Top AI Platforms Available on Hire (PAGE 79)

(PAGE 54)

Why Are Businesses Switching to Open Source? (PAGE 76)

How Airports Are Becoming Smarter (PAGE 24) Vol. 06 No. 04 ISSN 2454-4426

Pages: 140+8

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t x e N e u s s I

Contents �� se � � � � �� ou U �� hould Y S

AUGUST 2017 VOL. 06 | NO. 04 ISSN-2454-4426

EDITOR

: Ramesh Chopra

EDITORIAL : Editorial Secretary CORRESPONDENCE Phone: 011-26810601; E-mail: [email protected] (Technical queries: [email protected]) SUBSCRIPTIONS & : Phone: 011-26810601 or 02 or 03 MISSING ISSUES E-mail: [email protected] BACK ISSUES, BOOKS, CDs, PCBs etc.

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NEWSSTAND DISTRIBUTION

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GREEN TECHNOLOGY

48

Why Should You Invest?

SMART WORLD

GUIDES

76 Why everyone is switching to open source

60 DESIGN: How to reduce size and weight of pulse load power supply

78 Keep stress at bay with vehicle tracking systems

101 eStyle DIY: How to stream videos from your mobile to TV screen

79 Artiﬁcial intelligence on hire!

102 eStyle BUYERS’ GUIDE: Choosing the best smartphone under ` 10,000

: Ph: 022-24950047, 24928520 E-mail: [email protected]

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

DO-IT-YOURSELF

BENGALURU

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34 MATERIALS: From graphene to borophene electronics

PUNE

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54 TECH FOCUS: 3D printing quickens manufacturing, customises healthcare, and more

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Printed, published and owned by Ramesh Chopra. Printed at International Print-o-Pack Ltd, C-4 to C-11, Hosiery Complex, Phase-II Extension, NOIDA-201305, Gautam Budh Nagar, Uttar Pradesh, on the �rst day of each month and published from D-87/1, Okhla Industrial Area, Phase-1, New Delhi 110020. Copyright 2017. All rights reserved throughout the world. Reproduction of any material from this magazine in any manner without the written permission of the publisher is prohibited. Although every e�ort is made to ensure accuracy, no responsibility whatsoever is taken for any loss due to publishing errors. Articles that cannot be used are returned to the authors if accompanied by a self-addressed and su�ciently stamped envelope. But no responsibility is taken for any loss or delay in returning the material. EFY will not be responsible for any wrong claims made by an advertiser. Disputes, if any, will be settled in a New Delhi court only.

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104 Fan speed increasing regulator using PIC16F73 110 Bench power supply using a computer’s power supply 113 Arduino-based smartphone-controlled robot car 115 Solar garden light 116 Simple USB interface signal monitor 118 Optical slave ﬂash trigger

TAIWAN

You Pay (`) 1800 960

68 INNOVATION: Kingston’s DataTraveler Ultimate GT, Fortress Cyber Security, Quirklogic’s Quilla, Cubit, Tertill, LeGrow Smart Garden 72 INNOVATION: Betty: The super power to save power

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64 DESIGN: Ensuring lower thermal dissipation for higher efﬁciency

EVERYTHING YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT… 18 EDUCATION: ICTs for 21st century learning 24 TECHNOLOGY: IT at airports: Today and tomorrow 38 EMBEDDED: FPGAs in data centres: opportunities and challenges (Part 1)

120 Demo of 555 timer-based astable multivibrator using MATLAB

NEWS 12 83 96 99

Tech News Industry News New Products eStyle: First Look

EFY Plus DVD INDUSTRY 88 MARKET SURVEY: Lighting the LED way 92 TEST & MEASUREMENT: Automatic test equipment becoming modular 95 INTERVIEW: Shekhar Sanyal, IET India: The best opportunities are at the intersection of industries

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU PLUS

EFY+ DVD: EDA to numerical analysis made easy ...82 Zerynth 2.0.5: The IoT platform ..............................I Ease Your numerical analysis with Octave 4.2.1 .... IV OpenAPC: The process control software .............. VII Regulars 08 Feedback: Your suggestions 10 Q&A: Things you wanted to know

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FEEDBACK YOUR SUGGESTIONS

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE I ﬁnd EFY very interesting and useful. After ‘artiﬁcial intelligence’ in June issue, I suggest you also cover ‘machine learning.’ Rutuja Chaudhari Through e-mail EFY. Machine learning (ML) is not different from artiﬁcial intelligence (AI). It is a type of AI, which enables computers to learn rather than being explicitly programmed for every use-case. We have published several articles on ML, including deep learning, which is the latest trend in this space. Deep learning algorithms help a computer to autonomously learn, like a human does, and use this knowledge to react to different situations. We will continue to cover latest developments in machine learning in the coming issues. You may also refer to the related

Corrections In Alcatel phablet coverage under eStyle section of June issue, its operating system is mentioned as Android 5 Marshmallow instead of Android 6 Marshmallow. Alex George Through email In ‘Design Your Own Li-Fi Dongle and Speaker’ DIY project published in July issue, in PCB layout, the polarities of capacitors C1 through C3 are wrong and also wrongly connected to transistors T1 through T3. Samiuddhin Through email

From electronicsforu.com

Electronics Projects In ‘Arduino Based Digital Capacitance Meter: An Interrupt Based Approach’ DIY project published in March issue, can we measure the values of unpolarised capacitors? Sayantan Maiti EFY. Yes, you can measure the values of polarised and unpolarised capacitors. The ‘SMS Alert System’ DIY article published in November 2016 issue is interesting. For the app to operate, should I keep my computer connected to the Internet all the time? Elan EFY. As explained in the article, the project is based on cloud communication platform and so your computer should be connected to Internet all the time. Please share speciﬁcations of the solenoid lock used in ‘Fingerprint Door Unlock System Using Arduino’ DIY project published in Jan. 2016 issue. Vyshnavi EFY. We have used an Elock-S210M electric strike. It is a stainless-steel, fail-secure type electric lock with dimensions of 150x39x31 mm3. Applying electric current to the strike causes it to unlock. Its operating voltage and current are 12V DC and 450mA, respectively. topics ‘Machine Learning Basics For Newbies’ and ‘How Artiﬁcial Intelligence is Shaping the Healthcare Industry’ published in February and May issues, respectively.

PC�BASED OSCILLOSCOPE In ‘Low-Cost 3.7V to 5V-6V DC-to-DC Converter’ DIY article published in July issue, capacitor C5 is not connected to power supply ground in PCB layout. Manu Shankar Through email

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I am a great fan of EFY, especially its DIY section, and I thank you for every bit of knowledge the magazine shares. I am trying to assemble the ‘PC-Based Oscilloscope Using Arduino’ DIY project published in June issue. I have

extracted the zip folder ﬁles to my PC, but can’t use the PCScope ﬁle as it is password-protected. Please help. Chetan Jadhav Through e-mail EFY. When you download the source code of this project from source. efymag.com, you will ﬁnd three folders including a Password folder. You can get the password ‘1234’ from a text ﬁle of the password folder.

EFY ARTICLES EFY July issue featured ‘How Technology Is Helping Specially-Abled People’ article as also a ‘Wearable System To Help Visually Impaired Navigate’ under Tech News section. I would like to share that something similar was invented in India too, way back in 2013-14. The URL to this information is http://bit. ly/2hkDm3C Kunal A. Bhat Through e-mail EFY. Thanks for sharing the information!

WIRELESS WATER LEVEL INDICATOR Great things are always beautiful such as DIY projects in EFY! Can I add a relay to ‘Wireless Water Level Indicator Without Microcontroller’ DIY circuit published in July 2016 issue to control a single-phase 1HP motor? Abdul Razakh Edakat Through e-mail EFY. Thanks for your feedback and interest in the circuit! Yes, you can add a relay, but with additional control circuitry to turn the motor on and off. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Q&A

THINGS YOU WANTED TO KNOW! Ques. WHAT IS THE FREQUEN� CY BAND FOR TELEVISION CHANNEL BROADCASTS IN IN� DIA? IS THE SAME FREQUENCY USED FOR TV CHANNELS AND MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS ALL OVER THE WORLD? WHO DECIDES THE FREQUENCY SPECTRUM? Rashmi Kulshrestha

Ans. Television channels are available in VHF and UHF bands. Different countries use different frequency bandwidths and technologies. An international body, International Telecommunication Union (ITU) based in Geneva, provides for a uniﬁed television band

Courtesy: www.csgnetwork.com

plan, though not all countries observe this band plan. The ITU has been an intergovernmental public-private partnership organisation since its inception. India is one of ITU members. In India, all terrestrial TV spectrum allocation and broadcasting is controlled by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. The ITU coordinates the shared global use of the radio spectrum, promotes international cooperation in assigning satellite orbits, and works on worldwide technical standards. Different parts of the radio spectrum are allocated by the ITU for different radio transmission technologies and applications. Some general television frequencies are listed in the table above. 10

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

GSM frequency bands or frequency ranges are cellular frequencies designated by the ITU for GSM mobile phone operation. GSM-900 and GSM-1800 are used in most parts of the world, except countries like Japan and South Korea where GSM has never been introduced.

between the poles of a permanent magnet, the coil moves rapidly back and forth due to Faraday’s law of induction. This causes the diaphragm attached to the coil to move back and forth, pushing on the air to create sound waves. Voice coil, usually made of copper wire, is glued to the back of the diaphragm. When sound signal passes Q2. WHAT IS A LOAD CELL? through the voice coil, a magnetic ﬁeld CAN WE INTERFACE IT WITH is produced around the coil causing ARDUINO UNO R3 BOARD? the diaphragm to vibrate. The larger Pamarthi Kanakaraja the magnet and voice coil, the greater the power and efﬁciency of the loudA2. A load cell is a transducer that speaker. The coil is oriented co-axially converts mechanical force into an inside the gap; the outside of the gap electrical signal. The electrical signal being one pole and the centre post can be voltage change, current change (called the pole piece) being the other. or frequency change depending on The gap establishes a concenLoad Cell trated magnetic ﬁeld between the two poles of the permanent magnet. The pole piece and backplate are often a single piece, called the pole plate or yoke, as shown in Fig. 2. As pulses of electricity pass through the electromagnet coil, its magnetic ﬁeld direction rapFig. 1: Interfacing of a load cell with Arduino through an idly changes, causing the cone HX711 module whether the load cell is resistive or capacitive. Load cells are normally used to measure force or weight. Straingauge load cells are commonly used. You can interface a load cell with Arduino Uno R3 board. Fig. 1 shows interfacing of a load cell to an Arduino through an HX711 module.

Q3. HOW IS A SPEAKER CONSTRUCTED? HOW DOES IT PRODUCE SOUND? Sanket Sawalgi

Fig. 2: Speaker construction

to vibrate. The cone structure ampliﬁes these vibrations, pumping sound waves into the surrounding air and towards your ears. That’s how sound comes from a loudspeaker.

A3. A loudspeaker consists of paper or plastic moulded into a cone shape called ‘diaphragm.’ When audio signal is applied to the loudspeaker’s voice coil suspended in a circular gap

Answers compiled by Sani Theo, technical editor. Letters and questions for publication may be addressed to Editor, Electronics For You, D-87/1, Okhla Industrial Area, Phase 1, New Delhi 110020 (e-mail: [email protected]) and should include name and address of the sender WWW.EFYMAG.COM

�� NEWS TECHNOLOGY UPDATES

The brain of drones miniaturised Engineers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have designed a computer chip that uses a fraction of the power of larger drone computers and is tailored for drones as small as bottlecaps. The team, led by Sertac Karaman and Vivienne Sze, developed a low-power algorithm,

in tandem with pared-down hardware, to create the specialised computer chip. “This new approach to programming robots, which involves thinking about hardware and algorithms jointly, is key to scaling them down,” Karaman said. The new chip processes streaming images at 20 frames per second and automatically carries out commands to adjust a drone’s orientation in space. The streamlined chip performs all these computations while using just below two watts of power—making it much more efﬁcient than current drone-embedded chips. According to Karaman, the team’s design is the ﬁrst step toward engineering “the smallest intelligent drone that can ﬂy on its own.” He ultimately envisions disaster-response and searchand-rescue missions in which insect-sized drones ﬂit in and out of tight spaces to examine a collapsed structure or look for The computer chip designed by MIT engineers is tailored for a drone as small as a bottlecap trapped individuals. (Image courtesy: Christine Daniloff/MIT)

Machine learning to detect heart arrhythmias Stanford University researchers have shown that a machinelearning model can identify heart arrhythmias from an electrocardiogram (ECG) better than an expert doctor. The automated approach is also signiﬁcant because it could make quality care readily accessible in areas where resources are scarce. The team, led by professor Andrew Ng, trained their deep-learning algorithm on data collected from iRhythm’s wearable ECG monitor. They took approximately 30,000, 30-second clips from various patients that represented a variety of arrhythmias. To test the accuracy of the algorithm, the researchers gave a group of three expert cardiologists 300 undiagnosed 12

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

clips and asked them to reach a consensus about any arrhythmias present in the recordings. Working with these annotated clips, the algorithm could then predict how those cardiologists would label every second of other ECGs with which they were presented, in essence, giving a diagnosis. The group had six different cardiologists, working individually, diagnose the same 300-clip set. The researchers then compared which more closely matched the consensus opinion—the algorithm or the cardiologists working independently. They found that the algorithm is competitive with the cardiologists, and able to outperform cardiologists on most arrhythmias. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

TECH NEWS

Mobile control with facial gestures In everyday life, using mobile phones can be a challenge at times, especially when you are wearing gloves or have your hands full with purchases. Scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics Research (IGD) have come up with a solution: operation via head and face gestures, such as winking, smiling or nodding.

New polymer goes for a walk when illuminated Scientists at Eindhoven University of Technology and Kent State University have developed a new material that can undulate and therefore propel itself forward under the inﬂuence of light. To this end, they clamped a strip of this polymer material in a rectangular frame. When illuminated, it went for a walk all on its own. This small device, the size of a paperclip, is the world’s ﬁrst machine to convert light directly into walking, simply using one ﬁxed light source. The maximum speed is equivalent to that of a caterpillar, about half a centimetre per second. The researchers think it can be used to transport small items in hard-to-reach places or to keep the surface of solar cells clean. They placed grains of sand on the strip, which were removed by the undulating movement. The mechanism is so powerful that the strip can even transport an object that is much bigger and heavier than the device itself, uphill. The motion of the new material is due to the fact that one side contracts in reaction to light, while the other one expands, causing it to bulge when illuminated. That deformation disappears instantaneously once the light is

Test person with EarFS prototype controlling the mobile phone using facial gestures (Image courtesy: Fraunhofer IGD)

The EarFieldSensing (EarFS) device developed by the Fraunhofer IGD recognises the user’s facial gestures via a special ear plug to allow interaction with the mobile phone. The ear plug sensor detects even the smallest movements in the face through the way the shape of the ear canal changes and measures muscle currents that arise during the movement of the face or head. “The challenge was that these currents and movements are sometimes very small and need to be intensiﬁed,” explained Denys Matthies, scientist at the Fraunhofer IGD. “In addition, the sensors cannot be interfered with by other movements of the body, such as vibrations during walking or external interferences. To solve this problem, an additional reference electrode was applied to the earlobe which records the signals coming from outside.” The signals detected inside the ear are matched with the signals coming from the outside—the remaining useful signal enables clear facial gesture identiﬁcation, even if the person wearing the EarFS is in motion. EarFS not only allows micro-interactions with a smartphone, such as accepting and rejecting phone calls or operating the music player, but also conclusions about weariness, exertion and other emotional states of the user. As a result, smartphones could warn drivers when signs of weariness and fatigue are registered or could switch automatically to mute when drivers are concentrating attentively. 14

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

TU Eindhoven researcher Anne Hélène Gélébart showing the walking device (Image courtesy: Eindhoven University of Technology)

gone. Although the material looks transparent to the human eye, it fully absorbs the violet light the researchers used, thus creating a shadow behind it. The research team managed to reach this speciﬁc behaviour of the material using ‘liquid crystals.’ The principle relies on the incorporation of a fast responding light-sensitive variant in a liquid crystalline polymer network. The researchers engineered a material such that this response is translated to an instantaneous deformation of the strip when illuminated, and relaxation directly when the light is gone. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

TECH NEWS

Ruthenium rules for new fuel cells Rice University scientists have fabricated a durable catalyst for high-performance fuel cells by attaching single ruthenium atoms to graphene. Catalysts that drive the oxygen reduction reaction in fuel cells are usually made of platinum, which stands up to the acidic nature of the cell’s charge-carrying electrolyte. But platinum is expensive. The ruthenium-graphene combination may be a suitable replacement, said chemist James Tour, who developed the material with his colleagues at Rice and in China. In tests, its performance easily matched that of traditional platinum-based alloys and bested iron and nitrogen-doped graphene, another contender. “Ruthenium is often a highly active catalyst when ﬁxed between arrays of four nitrogen atoms, yet it is one-tenth the cost of traditional platinum,” Tour said. “And since we are using single atomic sites rather than small particles, there are no buried atoms that cannot react. All the atoms are available for reaction.” The material showed excellent tolerance against methanol crossover and carbon monoxide poisoning in an acidic medium, both of which degrade the efﬁciency of fuel cells; such degradation is a persistent problem with traditional platinum fuel cells.

Super-strong metal for next tech frontier Most microscopic sensors, shaped out of silicon, work well in average temperatures, but lose their strength and ability to conduct electronic signals with even modest amounts of heat. Silicon is also very brittle and prone to break. For these reasons, while silicon has been the heart of MEMS technologies for several generations now, the material is not ideal for future uses such as the Internet of Things. John Hopkins University researchers, in their pursuit of new materials, considered combinations of metals containing nickel, including nickel-based superalloys used to make jet engines. Considering the need for dimensional stability, the researchers experimented with adding the metals molybdenum and tungsten in hopes of curbing the degree pure nickel expands in heat. In a piece of equipment about the size of a refrigerator in a laboratory at Johns Hopkins, the team hit targets with ions to vapourise the alloys into atoms, depositing them onto a surface, or substrate. This created a ﬁlm that can be peeled away, thus creating freestanding ﬁlms with an average thickness of 29 microns—less than the thickness of a human hair. These freestanding alloy ﬁlms exhibited extraordinary properties. When pulled, they showed a tensile strength— the ability to maintain shape without deforming or breaking—three times greater than high-strength steel. 16

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Non-toxic alternative for next-generation solar cells Researchers from the University of Cambridge and the United States have shown that solar cells incorporating bismuth can replicate the properties of lead-based solar cells, but without the same toxicity concerns. Later calculations by another research group showed that bismuth-based cells can convert light into energy at

Bismuth oxyiodide light absorbers (Image courtesy: Steve Penney/University of Cambridge)

efﬁciencies up to 22 per cent, which is comparable to the most advanced solar cells currently on the market. Most of the solar cells which we see covering ﬁelds and rooftops are made from silicon. Although silicon is highly efﬁcient at converting light into energy, it has a very low ‘defect tolerance,’ meaning that silicon needs to have very high levels of purity, making it energy-intensive to produce. For their study, researchers looked at bismuth oxyiodide—a material which was previously investigated for use in solar cells and water splitting, but was not thought to be suitable because of low efﬁciencies and because it degraded in liquid electrolytes. The researchers used theoretical and experimental methods to revisit this material for possible use in solid-state solar cells. They found that bismuth oxyiodide is as tolerant to defects as lead halide perovskites—a promising alternative to silicon solar cells. Bismuth oxyiodide is also stable in air for at least 197 days, which is a signiﬁcant improvement over some lead halide perovskite compounds. By sandwiching the bismuth oxyiodide light absorber between two oxide electrodes, they were able to demonstrate a record performance, with the device converting 80 per cent of light into electrical charge. Bismuth-based devices can be made using common industrial techniques, suggesting that they can be produced at scale and at low cost. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

EDUCATION

ICTs For 21st Century Learning

I Atul M. Kulkarni is an M.Tech in Communication Engineering from National Institute of Technology, Karnataka. Currently, he is working as a lecturer at Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University, Lonere, Raigad

nformation and communication technologies (ICTs) have brought about a paradigm shift in education. Online educational methodology and tools like massive open online course (Mooc), modular object-oriented dynamic learning environment (Moodle), videoconferencing, virtual laboratories, screencasts, e-mail, forums, search engines, blogs, podcasts, vodcasts, wikis, vokis, high-tech 3D graphics, e-Groups, learning dialogue videos, learning-by-doing videos, digital game/toy-based learning and ﬂippedclassrooms with associated pedagogy of active learning have quickly emerged as the backbone of effective education in this century. In fact, blended learning is the necessity of 21st century.

Beneﬁts

Computer-like gadgets have emerged as guided and effective learning tools for kids (Image courtesy: www.amazon.in)

ICTs provide a great solution for information collection and sharing, making learning more relaxed and productive— that too for all, anytime and anywhere. Tools like free and open source software (FOSS), and websites like github.com and SourceForge.net, help students with knowledge building, reﬂection, sharing and collaboration in project work. ICTs also promote self-evaluation and self-study via online tools. Users can learn in their own dialects, which ﬁlls the gap of language barrier in teachinglearning process. Integration of ICTs in education helps students, teachers and administrators

alike. ICTs help where traditional methods of learning may not be effective, such as for students with learning disabilities like dyscalculia and dyslexia. Research and revision can be done on the Internet as well as by using storage media like CD-ROMs and USB drives and application programs. In fact, application programs with animation, video, quizzes and sound make learning more interactive. Teachers and administrators use ICT tools like electronic data interchange or management information system for quick and accurate exam entries or other data logging operations. This reduces expenditure (printing and posting) and errors as well. As there is less paper work, it’s more environment-friendly and saves teachers’ time. Attendance monitoring software can automatically send a message to parents if their child is absent from class. Some schools are now using ICT to manage their day-to-day activities and monitor students. Innovative teaching-learning practices and methodologies are emerging with integration of ICT in learning.

Tools and methodologies employed Digital games and toys. Digital games and toys shape thinking and creativity ability of learners. Animated cartoon learning videos, storytelling toys, and educational learning tablets and computer-like gadgets have emerged as guided and effective learning tools for kids. Well-designed collaborative 3D learning games are emerging as a future learning tool for smart class-

TABLE I

TRADITIONAL VS ICT-BASED EDUCATIONAL APPROACH Traditional approach

ICT based approach

Teacher acts as a sage on the stage

Teacher acts as a guide on the side

Classroom is limited by its physical size

Teaching a large number of students is possible

Content delivery is synchronous

Content delivery is anytime, anywhere, not synchronous

Content delivered using PowerPoint presenta- Content delivered via multimedia, simulation, video-ontions, blackboards, textbooks, videos, etc demand, videoconferencing, digital library, etc Teacher-centered classroom

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Student-centered classroom

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EDUCATION rooms. These scaffold a student’s interactions with peers and teachers in real time. IIT Bombay has introduced a low-cost laptop, FOSSEE, with more than 150 open source software packages on this system. The Indian government is also spending a lot of money to create good-quality educational content through initiatives such as National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) and Virtual Labs. Another important initiative is Spoken Tutorial for IT training. Simulation software. Simulation tools are used when conducting experiments on a real system would be impossible or impractical; for example, when prototyping and testing a system involves a high cost, a delicate product doesn’t support extensive tests, or duration of the experiment in real time is impractical. Simulation tools help to disseminate conceptual and complex ideas to a wide variety of learners using appropriate media and methods to promote understanding. Going beyond demos, simulation provides animated, interactive and game-like environments to enhance analytic skill. Computer simulation increases perception of students.

zSpace 200 provides an immersive, interactive hardware and software platform for students, educators, researchers and corporate trainers (Image courtesy: https://upload.wikimedia.org)

Virtual reality and augmented reality. Augmented reality and virtual reality are both related technologies, and using 3D environment or head-mounted display these provide an enhanced or enriched experience of an imaginary reality. Virtual reality is commonly achieved through a head-mounted display, or handheld controller. It is an artiﬁcial simulation of a real-life environment or situation where people can have hands-on practice, like ﬂight simulation for aircraft

Amplitude-modulated signal generation using NI-FGEN waveform generator—a virtual instrument (Image courtesy: www.ni.com)

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pilots. It immerses the users by making them feel like they are experiencing the situation. On the other hand, augmented reality is used more in mobile devices like smart phones, laptops and tablets. Augmented reality-based piano learning apps/trainers are also available in the market. Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) is the coding language used for virtual reality. Skills can be easily enhanced through virtual and augmented reality-based training. For example, new train drivers can be trained in driving skills using simulators that provide a realistic simulation of any event and allow exercise of control in any crisis situation. Such a training provides the opportunity to safely train the driver in avoiding real-life accidents. The future of education resides in virtual reality and augmented reality environments where students from around the world converge in a magical hands-on learning experience. Virtual reality creates an immersive audio, visual and spatial learning environment, which helps students to explore and learn at their own pace. Flipped classrooms. Flipping the classroom is a new approach to education. It reverses the traditional WWW.EFYMAG.COM

EDUCATION roles of classroom lecture and asTABLE II signment at home. In the traditional MOODLE FEATURES FOR TEACHERS AND STUDENTS model, the teacher delivers lectures Teachers Students to the students in a classroom. Then Create online courses Follow online lessons the students do their assignments at Upload files and lessons Upload assignments and tests home, maybe with the help of a parOpen forums Can start a thread on the general discussion forum ent or Internet. In the ﬂipped classDivide students into classes Increase self-directed learning of a topic room model, students are directed Create online tests and quizzes Perform self-evaluation via quizzes to watch short-duration screencasts or video lectures at home before Provide a platform for students by creating Follow chat sessions in real time chat sessions joining the class. Then students do Create wikis and glossary Work in collaboration exercises in class in peer or collaborative groups. Flipped classrooms help to enhance student interactions in the classroom. Flipped classrooms with associated pedagogy of active learning like well-designed think-pairshare, peer instruction, team-pairsolo and paired-problem-solving activity help to enhance problem solving, decision making and con�� ceptualisation skill of learners. An effective ﬂipped classroom strategy is one in which information and a total of 1.5 million students acquisition, collaboration, concept transmission happens outside the certiﬁed as of July 2017. To promote clariﬁcation, review or feedback. classroom and information assimilaICT inclusion, MHRD has also started Technology-enhanced learning tion happens inside the classroom. a national award for teachers using environment, self-learning, skill Moocs and Moodle. Moodle is ICT for innovation in education. improvement and lifelong learnan open source web application ing are the key aspects of Moocs Way forward used to create interactive online and Moodles. learning sites. This free online In India NPTEL is a Mooc ICT will become a strong catalyst for a learning management system provider, promoted and funded by sea change among many educational enables educators to create their the Ministry of Human Resource practices. There is a need to shift from own private website ﬁlled with Development (MHRD), with seven teacher-centered classrooms to studynamic courses that extend learnIITs and IISc as its partner institutes. dent-centric classrooms for outcomeing anytime, anywhere. Its peer It currently has 160 ongoing courses based education. Using technology, grading feature allows learners to with about 350 completed courses teachers can create student-friendly grade and assess their environments for in-class as own and other course well out-of-class learning. members’ work as a The time is ripe to rethink group. Moocs provide and redesign the educational sysfree access to organtems, processes and ICT-based ised content with learning pedagogies. In fact, personalised learning researchers are working on an environments using amalgamation of cognitive capablogs, wikis, google bilities and the Internet of Things groups, Moodle, etc. A technologies to develop personlarge number of free alised learning tools for both courses are available students and educators. With a as Moocs from organiradical backhaul of the education sations such as edX. system in sight, there is also an Discussion forums urgent need to train teachers in help with information NPTEL site visits across countries (Image courtesy: http://voxiitk.com) the use of ICT tools. 22

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TECHNOLOGY

IT AT AIRPORTS: Today And Tomorrow “The new Terminal 2 isn’t just one building but a complex machine comprised of 118,000 individual assets that need to work in harmony to deliver a good experience”—John Holland-Kaye, CEO, Heathrow Airport

Deepak Halan is an associate professor at School of Management Sciences, Apeejay Stya University

Self-service biometric passport gate being used by a passenger at Heathrow Airport (Image courtesy: www. futuretravelexperience. com)

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msterdam’s Schiphol and London Heathrow airports have installed self-service biometric passport gates that use facial recognition technology. Japan’s All Nippon Airways, on the other hand, makes smart tablets available to travellers so that they can check in quickly, navigate the airport, and receive real-time messages about their ﬂights. Information technology is quickly transforming aviation and touching every aspect of air travel from the point of departure to arrival at destination. The airports of tomorrow are going to be a very new and exciting experience and are expected to become one of the more pleasing parts of the journey, rather than one of the most boring. The travel experience will begin the moment you make your reservation. For example, on arrival at the airport, you can choose how to check in: auto checkin when entering the terminal, use a self-service electronic kiosk or stand at a conventional desk-based check-in. To check-in bags, self-tagging stations will allow you to efﬁciently manage

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your luggage. If you have no bags, you go straight for security check where identity sensors will conﬁrm your identity. Your boarding pass, identiﬁcation and biometrics will allow you total control of passage through the airport, all the way to aircraft boarding. The key to this automated travel vision is biometrics, in the form of iris scan, ﬁngerprint, facial recognition, etc. Digital technology will eliminate holdups in check-in, bag drop, security and boarding by doing away with the most time-consuming element—human interaction. Biometrics in every phase of the process will help airports to remain vigilant with passengers. For example, on inbound international ﬂights, the passenger veriﬁcation process will complete even before the aircraft lands. Soon your face will be your passport. Australia has developed the technology to introduce ﬁngerprints, iris or facial recognition at major air and seaports to replace passports for passenger identiﬁcation by 2020. This will help to improve security by making it easier to detect threats. The system will also avoid paperwork or manual processing for majority of the passengers and make it easier and quicker for people going in and out of airports.

Integration and wireless innovations Fully integrated, end-to-end solutions using information and wireless technology will eliminate the use of large amounts of cables, leading to lower costs, greater efﬁciency, greater mobility and geo-location, and a greatly enhanced passenger experience. For example, using wireless beacon technology and a simple smart phone app, individual or group messages can be sent to inform only the targeted passengers of relevant gate changes, or ground handlers can be apprised of a weather forecast change. These systems will identify the closest ground handler to secure vehicles nearby. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

TECHNOLOGY control centre, distribution servers, input terminals and display technology. The system control centre is responsible for storing, processing and transferring all ﬂight and general information. The processed information is sent by FIDS via LAN to the connected distribution servers in real time so that the users are supplied with high-quality consistent information. This information is processed and transferred, by the distribution server, to the corresponding display devices. The FIDS system communicates and supports any type of display device such as CRT monitors, LCD ﬂat Enhanced passenger panels, plasma displays, Snapshot of a smart FIDS end-user screen (Image courtesy: www. experience �� split ﬂap boards and LED signage. It is possible to Imagine boarding a ﬂight use new communication technoloheld by the crew could be fed with after scanning your boarding pass, gies to distribute and display the highly speciﬁc information, such as tagging and checking your bags information in any required format, a ﬂier’s request not to wake him up and locating the nearest spot for such as text, audio, video, imfor a meal. The devices could even an airport manicure by tapping a ages, animations and movies. The be used to quicken maintenance— screen. Passengers will be able to system is cost-effective and provides for example, by taking a picture of a weigh their own luggage without ﬂexible state-of-the-art multimedia damaged tray table and transmitting the assistance of an agent, and drop display. It is easily conﬁgurable and it to the mechanic at the other end the bags off at luggage acceptance automatically collects the inforto seek help in ﬁxing right away. points. Do-it-yourself boarding will mation, organises it according to allow passengers to speed up the Smart ﬂight information programmed graphical and paging process of getting to their seats. display system formats, and disseminates to keep Self-service kiosks will be available passengers, operations staff, airport for passengers to resolve issues such A smart ﬂight information display management, ground handling as booking new ﬂights if previous system (FIDS) also includes the personnel or airlines crew informed. ﬂight was cancelled. baggage information display system Information on the ﬂight’s status, Flight attendants will have and advertising system. A key comboarding time, gate or baggage a new, advanced type of mobile ponent of the airport’s integrated belt assignments, boarding gates, device that provides every bit of inoperational systems, smart FIDS are baggage sorting carousels, arrival formation right from the name and directly connected to the airport’s and departure areas, etc is availage of passengers who might need a operational database and resource able in real time. It can play a key little extra attention to notes about management. With the airport role in airport safety, for example, ﬂiers’ all previous ﬂying experiencenvironments becoming increasingly by providing immediate informaes. They will carry phablets for comintense, the ﬂight and operational tion for airport evacuation in munication with passengers, who information needs to be dissemicase of an emergency or security will be able to text their requirement nated quickly and cost-effectively. alert. The fault tolerance option is from their seat. The devices handFor this purpose, the FIDS include a

A system of perimeter cameras controlled wirelessly will create geofencing to keep speciﬁc assets in particular areas, warn ramp drivers about their speed, or immediately direct fuel trucks or other services to the relevant aircraft. It will be possible to integrate Flight attendants are carrying more advanced devices with passage of time (Image courtesy: www.technologyrecord.com) information technology in a modular manner, choosing a la carte from an extensive menu based on need and budget. Innovations in secure and reliable cloud technology will help substitute local infrastructure with shared service, making the technology more efﬁcient and cost-effective, even for the smallest airports.

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TECHNOLOGY conﬁgured with automated loadsharing and redundancy on multiple servers to provide built-in back-up and reliability. Each display device is continuously monitored and its proper functioning veriﬁed in real time from authorised workstations. The system can also provide visual paging for the hearing impaired and display weather information, promotional and advertising information.

transportation information. Additional revenue for the airport can be generated from advertising integrated with the app. The integration includes QR codes on existing static or digital advertising.

Interactive kiosks Kiosks provide a complete integration of all the elements found in the

kiosks are static and therefore the information can be presented in a larger format, accessed directly by the users. These push the information to the traveller via print or their mobile device and can also provide a direct connection to social media.

Air trafﬁc control technology

To prevent collisions, air trafﬁc control (ATC) enforces trafﬁc separation rules to ensure each aircraft maintains a minimum amount of sepaDigital displays ration based on the type of ﬂight and the class of airDigital displays provide space. It is also responsible ﬂight information, paid for the standard separation advertising, airport marketand efﬁcient movement of ing, and regulatory and aircrafts and vehicles on emergency information the taxiways and runways consistently across multiple of the airport. The responlocations, which is a laborisibility areas of ATC span ous task with static signage. across airport control, Unlike static signage, these ground control, air control, require little cabling. These Information technology at work at London’s Heathrow Airport (Image courtesy: http://airnation.net) clearance and ﬂight data, can be controlled and and approach and terminal updated instantly and recontrol. motely. Low life-cycle cost Controllers use surveilresults in higher revenues. lance radar for airborne Digital displays enable trafﬁc approaching and travellers to easily ﬁnd indeparting to display a formation about shopping, map of the area, posidining and other airport tions of various aircrafts, amenities. ‘Map it’ faciland data tags that include ity provides way ﬁnding aircraft identiﬁcation, through a digital map, with speed, altitude and other graphically detailed direcinformation. In adverse tions and estimated walking weather conditions, these time to the location chosen. use surface movement This information can also radar and surface movebe easily sent to a smart ment guidance and control phone using QR code. Stacked planes waiting to land at Heathrow Airport represented by �� systems to control trafMobile phones ﬁc on the taxiways and runways. Displays may be optical Web pages can be tailored to mobile other signage in the terminal and live video and/or synthetic imdevices, utilising apps designed allow users to choose information ages. Remote and virtual towers use speciﬁcally for the airport to provide to be displayed at any given time. controllers located somewhere else all the information that can be Checkpoint information, weather, than at the local airport tower to found on traditional in-terminal advertising elements, and terminal provide air trafﬁc control services signage. For example, the app ‘Fly marketing information are made based on the latest IT and artiﬁcial Smart’ has detailed terminal maps available in an interactive format. intelligence technology. that can locate your position in an Each user can select from sevGround control covers areas such airport, ﬁnd a nearby restaurant, eral different languages to ﬁnd the as taxiways, inactive runways, holdtrack a ﬂight and provide ground needed information. The interactive 28

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TECHNOLOGY team resource management make recorded continuous loop on a speing areas, and transitional aprons or this communication process efﬁciﬁc frequency, called the automatic intersections. It is vital for smooth cient, reliable and clear. terminal information service. overall safety and efﬁciency of the airport operations, and sequencing Clearance and ﬂight data Radar used at the of departure aircrafts. Any aircraft, control centres vehicle, or person walking or workClearance delivery system ensures ing in these areas is required to have that aircrafts have correct aerodrome Control centres use a long-range ‘clearance’ from ground control. information, such as weather and radar that, at higher altitudes, can This is normally done via VHF/ airport conditions, route after desee aircrafts within 370km (200 nauUHF radio or using smart tical miles) of the radar phones. Busier airports antenna. These also use also use surface moveTRACON radar to control ment radar, to display airthe areas not covered by crafts and vehicles on the the long-range radar. ground, as an additional Since no radar systems tool to control ground are available for trafﬁc trafﬁc, especially at night control over the oceanic or in poor visibility. areas, oceanic controllers The capabilities of provide ATC information these systems are being using procedural control. enhanced using digital These procedures use technology. While conaircraft position reports, ventional systems display time, altitude, distance a map of the airport and and speed to ensure the target, latest systems separation. The informaprovide high-quality tion is recorded on ﬂight �� www.satellitetoday.com) mapping, radar targets, progress strips and in spedata blocks, safety alerts, cially developed computer and improved interface systems. Newer systems with other systems. implement automatic Air control, also dependent surveillance– known as ‘tower control,’ broadcast (ADS-B) as is responsible for the acpart of their surveillance tive runway surfaces. It capability. clears aircrafts for takeoff ADS-B reverses the or landing, and ensures radar concept: Instead that the prescribed of the radar ‘ﬁnding’ a runway separation exists target by interrogating at all the time. Under unthe transponder, the ADSsafe conditions, a landing Plane manufacturer Airbus is likely to offer planes with panoramic windows by equipped aircraft sends a 2050 (Image courtesy: www.dailymail.co.uk) aircraft is instructed to position report as deter‘go-around’ and is mined by the navigation re-sequenced into the landing patequipment on board the aircraft. parture and time restrictions related tern. A very efﬁcient and effective Normally, the aircraft reports a posito the ﬂight. Busier airports use communication is maintained betion, automatically or initiated by ground movement planner or trafﬁc tween air control and ground control management coordinator to prevent the pilot, at a predetermined time into ensure that the ground control is terval. Controllers may also request taxiway and apron gridlock. Flight aware of any operation impacting more frequent reports to establish data, combined with clearance the taxiways and to create ‘gaps’ in aircraft position for speciﬁc reasons. delivery, ensures that both controlthe arrival trafﬁc to allow taxiing ADS can be used where it is not poslers and pilots have the most current trafﬁc to cross runways and enable sible to locate a radar system, such information on weather changes, departing aircrafts to take off. In as over water. outages, airport ground delays/ advanced systems, applications such Computerised radar displays ground stops, runway closures, as crew resource management and are now being designed to accept etc. State-of-the-art systems use a 30

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TECHNOLOGY ADS inputs as part of the display. Precision approach radars are used by military controllers, to assist the pilot in ﬁnal phases of landing in places where instrument landing system and other sophisticated airborne equipment are unavailable to assist the pilots in marginal or near-zero visibility conditions. A radar archive system (RAS) is used to keep an electronic record of all the radar information for a few weeks, which can be useful for search and rescue. It is also useful for technicians maintaining the radar systems.

Space-based ATC NASA’s new space-based, higherfrequency, higher-bandwidth radio system can track aircrafts in real time across the globe by sending large quantities of data back and forth pretty fast. The communication system can be reprogrammed from a distance to ensure that ﬂights are quickly located in case of

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mishaps. The radios are used to create a space-based global air trafﬁc control system. Under this project, a constellation of 66 satellites equipped with the new radios will be launched into the orbit. The radios are programmed to receive signals from ADS-B airplane transceivers, which will automatically send out a ﬂight’s number, location, heading and other details. This will make it possible to keep track of all the aircrafts in the world within seconds. With realtime global tracking, planes will be able to ﬂy with less space between them and therefore take more direct routes.

Coming up: airport cities In a few years from now, biometric face recognition software, machinereadable passports and high-speed laser molecular scanners will enable ﬂiers to clear security and customs checking at the airport within sec-

onds. Once inside the aircraft, they can look forward to being treated with massage seats where they are served various drinks and vitamins and provided a perfumed environment of their choice. Sound showers will help them relax and get a perfect night’s sleep. The entire body of the plane will be made up of panoramic windows that can be made fully transparent at a click, thus providing travellers with astounding 360-degree views of the world around them. Already we have some airports that are like a mini city, thus doing away with the need to step out into the city if you have a brief layover. Passenger processing technologies—such as those already in the marketplace—hold great promise to leverage greater system integration, mobile technology and smart devices for greater efﬁciency, lower operating costs and a transformative passenger experience.

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MATERIALS

From GRAPHENE To BOROPHENE Electronics

T Dr S.S. Verma is a professor at Department of Physics, Sant Longowal Institute of Engineering and Technology, Sangrur, Punjab

he discovery of graphene in 2004 by two researchers, Prof. Andre Geim and Prof. Kostya Novoselov at the University of Manchester (UK), created quite an excitement. This pioneering work won the duo Nobel Prize in Physics in 2010. However, there are some inherited limitations of graphene as a wonder material, forcing scientists to look for an alternative. In this quest, they have discovered a new two-dimensional (2D) material called ‘borophene’ that is thought to exhibit electronic properties better than graphene. This article dwells on the journey from graphene to borophene.

Graphene

Flexible and transparent electronics (Image courtesy: Berkeley Lab, USA)

Graphene is a one-atom thin sheet of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal format or a ﬂat monolayer of carbon atoms that are tightly packed into a 2D honeycomb lattice. Owing to exceptional strength, ﬂexibility and conductance, it is expected to shape almost all aspects of future technologies. Researchers around the world have found that graphene has promise for applications in electronics ranging from displays to random-access memory. Noted for the speed at which electrons pass through it, graphene has already proved to be a miracle electronic material with properties suitable for design of strong, fast, ﬂexible and transparent electronic devices, printed graphene in paper electronics, and car batteries.

Its limitations With applications touching humans in every quartet of life, graphene seems to have limitless capabilities, though with the traditional challenge of its production cost. In 2013, a 34

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graphene ﬂake the size of one micrometre cost more than $1000. Obviously, this is why graphene is one of the most expensive materials on Earth. However, upscaling of graphene production is one of the most researched subjects and we are not far away from attaining scalability of the graphene production process. Researchers have devised a method for producing graphene-treated silver nanowires, which could signiﬁcantly reduce production costs for nanowire-based displays. This could mean that graphene offers a real alternative to indium-tin oxide in ﬂexible low-cost touchscreen displays. Nevertheless, some of the major limitations of graphene include: 1. High bending stiffness for devices that also need to stretch, compress or even twist. 2. Band gap not suitable to simply get the characteristics of switch on and off. 3. High susceptibility to oxidative environments when used as a catalyst 4. Some toxic qualities. Scientists have discovered that graphene features jagged edges that can easily pierce cell membranes, allowing it to enter into cells and disrupt normal functions.

Borophene and its properties Scientists are interested in two-dimensional materials mainly for their unique electronic properties. Borophene is an unusual material because it shows many metallic properties at nanoscale. Even though threedimensional, or bulk, boron is nonmetallic and semiconducting. Recently, researchers successfully synthesised borophene. The outcome was not only similar to graphene but also much lighter and stronger, contributing to the novel desirable properties. Researchers showed that borophene has a record high ﬂexibility, a higher stiffness-toweight ratio and higher ideal strength than WWW.EFYMAG.COM

MATERIALS

Wavy borophene (Image courtesy: Zhuhua Zhang/Rice University)

graphene and the polymers currently used. Superconductivity of borophene is critical. Borophene grown on a silver substrate takes a wavy form, which makes it suitable for ﬂexible electronics. As a 2D metal, borophene helps ﬁll a void in the family of 2D nanoelectronic materials. With the synthesis and characterisation of borophene researchers have moved a step ahead. Properties such as low mass density, high strength and high levels of ﬂexibility make borophene a promising candidate as a reinforced element for designing composites and for ﬂexible nanodevices, such as ﬂexible electrodes and contacts for nanoelectronics.

Development status Most of the work with borophene so far has been aimed at synthesis as well as characterisation of the material’s properties. Advanced computer simulation methods showed formation of crinkles in the corrugated surface. Borophene is a proposed allotrope of boron made up of single-atom sheets. The research reveals that one cluster consists of 36 boron atoms arranged in a twodimensional sheet with a perfect hexagonal hole in the middle, which is of real signiﬁcance. It suggests that theoretical calculations about a boron planar structure might be right. Although bulk allotropes of carbon and boron differ greatly, in nano regime small clusters of these elements show remarkable similarities. Boron analogues of twodimensional carbon allotropes such as graphene have been predicted. Researchers demonstrated theoretically that borophene is enriched with more interesting electronic characteristics than graphene but a strong foothold in production was missing. Theoretical studies predict that 2D boron sheets will adopt an atomic conﬁguration similar to that of boron atomic clusters. Recently, researchers successfully synthesised borophene using molecular beam epitaxy. They reported the formation of two-dimensional boron by depositing the elemental boron onto a silver surface under ultra-high-vacuum conditions. The graphene-like structure was buckled, weakly bonded to the substrate, and metallic. 36

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MATERIALS Borophene prefers to be ﬂat because that’s where its energy is lowest. It, however, needs the underlying substrate to make it wavy. When grown on a featureless surface, its natural form is ﬂat like graphene. When grown on silver, borophene adopts its accordion-like form while silver reconstructs itself to match. Once borophene is formed, it can easily be removed as the bond between silver and borophene is weak. This may allow atom-thick slices of borophene to be transferred to any substrate once it has been formed with the corrugations. This wavy conformation so far seems unique due to the exceptional structural ﬂexibility and particular interactions of borophene with silver, and may be initially triggered by a slight compression in the layer when a bit too many boron atoms get onto the surface. For the ﬁrst time, research team has made composites and combined borophene with another material to create heterostructures as the fundamental building block for fabrication of electronic devices.

Applications Borophene is both metallic and atomically thin, holding great promise for applications ranging from electronics to photovoltaics. 2D materials like graphene are touted as ideal for electronics but graphene being too ﬂat and hard to stretch for ﬂexible, wearable devices, wavy borophene might prove better than graphene. Borophene-based heterostructures will guide future and ongoing research into using borophene for functional nanoelectronic devices.

What the future holds There is a need to develop reliable encapsulation and/or passivation schemes that allow borophene to be removed from an ultra-high-vacuum environment so that a practical device could actually be fabricated and tested. When borophene is on silver (both of which are metallic), the silver substrate electrically shorts borophene, which creates serious problems for any device application. This calls for transfer of borophene from the silver growth substrate to an electrically insulating substrate. Borophene could be the key to the future wearable and stretchable devices, owing to its ﬂexibility while exhibiting electrical properties. Materials that are not only ﬂexible but can also stretch would enable electronics to be mounted onto any surface with much lower chances of breaking up. Superconductive materials are highly valuable in the wearable industry, where signals must ﬂow without any issue. Therefore borophene may also ﬁnd its way into the future of superconductors and, coupled with room-temperature superconductors, it may change the world forever. Hence more work is required before the full potential of borophene is realised in electronic applications. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

37

EMBEDDED Part 1 of 2

FPGAs IN DATA CENTRES: Opportunities And Challenges

D V.P. Sampath is a senior member of IEEE and a member of Institution of Engineers India. He is currently working as technical architect at AdeptChips, Bengaluru. He is a regular contributor to national newspapers, IEEE-MAS section, and has published international papers on VLSI and networks

Dr V.N. Ramakrishnan is an associate professor in Department of Micro & Nanoelectronics, VIT University, Vellore

ata centres play a major role in expanding the enterprise computing capabilities. These are a centralised repository for storage, management and dissemination of data and information. Today’s central processing units (CPUs) are powerful and well-suited for high-level decision-making and control tasks, but their computing power cannot be scaled economically to keep pace with ever-increasing data centre requirements. Hardware acceleration is a solution which may be implemented using a variety of technologies, including application-speciﬁc integrated circuits (ASICs), ﬁeld-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), graphical processing units (GPUs) and network processing units (NPUs). FPGAs are well known for their versatility. Many of these implement communication and control functions wholly, or in part, as soft intellectual property (IP). So in data centres FPGAs can play a role in cognitive computing, high-performance computing and the Internet of Things. These can serve as coprocessors to accelerate CPU workloads. This is an approach used in supercomputing and high-performance computing (HPC), done usually by teaming CPUs with Nvidia GPUs or Intel’s x86-based Xeon Phi coprocessors. Cloud service systems are based upon processors. Software is driving the change, which extends beyond the rise of machine learning and training neural models. A whole new set of workloads is running in the cloud today, including virtualising net-

works, storage processing, compression and encryption. FPGAs slot into the standard server, drawing 25W from its PCI Express (PCIe) Gen 3 slot. An integrated platform is one in which FPGA developers can upload their design in an IP library and data centre users can download the IP cores they need. This decoupling will enable widespread adoption of heterogeneous processing in data centres. Data centre operators can optimise the infrastructures by hyperscale, where FPGAs offer more sophisticated processing architectures that bring HPC-style parallel processing of workloads.

Accelerator basics Accelerating the data centre applications has become a requirement due to power and space constraints. Accelerators are needed to increase performance at a low total cost of ownership for targeted workloads. An accelerator is a separate architectural substructure on the same chip or on a different die. It is architected with a different set of objectives than the base processor, where objectives are based on the needs of a special class of applications. Accelerators are tuned to provide a higher performance at lower cost, or at lower power, or with less development effort than with the general-purpose base hardware. Depending on the domain, accelerators often bring greater than ten times advantage in performance, cost or power consumption over a general-purpose processor. Examples of accelerators include PCIe Attach

General Purpose Cores

Cost (Area, Power) ��

Ease of Programming/ Development

Cost (Latency, Granularity)

QPI Attach On-Package On-Chip

Fixed-Function

On-Core

Distance from Core

Flexibility

Fig. 1: Accelerator architecture

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Fig. 2: Accelerator attach WWW.EFYMAG.COM

EMBEDDED Coherent accelerators HyperTransport, front-side bus (FSB) and QuickPath Interconnect (QPI) are not commercially successful because these have a proprietary ‘in socket’ attached, server mechanical ﬁt challenges, need to give up processor socket, proprietary speciﬁcation, licensing issues and always-lagging 6-12 month Cadence. IBM’s Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface (CAPI) interface resolves all these issues. This OpenPowerbased solution is well documented

Fig. 3: ‘In socket’ coherent accelerators CAPI PCIe Cards

POWER8 Modules

Core count/size

Four targeted implementations SMP scalability/memory subsystem Scale-out-2 socket optimised Robust two-socket SMP system Direct memory attach ��

SMT4 core �� Linux ecosystem optimised

SMT8 core 12 SMT8 cores/chip PowerVM ecosystem continuity

Cache and interconnect

Cache and interconnect

Cache and interconnect

Cache and interconnect

�� Fig. 4: Power8 modules with CAPI PCIe cards Scale-up multisocket optimised Scalable system topology/capacity �� Buffered memory attach ��

Fig. 6: SMT4 vs SMT8 core

POWER8 Processor

Fig. 7: CAPI FPGA accelerator (based on a standard PCIe accelerator) Fig. 5: Power processor roadmap

ﬂoating-point coprocessors, GPUs to accelerate the rendering of a vertex-based 3D model into a 2D viewing plane, and accelerators for the motion estimation step of a video codec. Applications such as 40

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big data analytics, search, machine learning, network functions virtualisation, wireless 4G/5G, in-memory database processing, video analytics and network processing beneﬁt from acceleration engines, which need to move data seamlessly among the various system components.

and already commercialised. It has proprietary ‘in socket’ attached, and processors use all the available sockets. It is based on PCIe, hence there are no mechanical challenges. It is free, simple, OpenPowerlicensed. Also, it is in sync with Power and Cadence’ PCIe interface IP.

Power9 processor IBM’s next-generation Power9 processor will have 24 cores, double that of today’s Power8 chips. Design is optimised for two-socket scale-out servers (hence the name Power9 SO), and includes onchip acceleration for compression and encryption. Power9 will be available in two WWW.EFYMAG.COM

EMBEDDED CAPI overview 1. Custom defined accelerator within processor context 2. Function based accelerator (a) Main application executed on host processor (b) Computed heavy function offloaded (c) Single binary with both hardware and software versions of function � Runs without accelerator 3. CAPI device: Full peer to processor (a) Enables memory between accelerator function unit (AFU) and application � � � Via power service layer, AFU can understand application’s virtual address � � � No need to pin application memory for I/O � � � AFU works within application context

Power9 processor will be a 14nm high-performance FinFET product. It will directly attach to DDR4 RAM, connect to peripherals and Nvidia GPUs via PCIe Gen 4 and NVLink 2.0, and transfer accelerator data at 25Gbps speeds. Power9 processor will have multiple connectors to attach FPGAs, GPUs and ASICs. It will be well suited for AI, cognitive computing, analytics, visual computing and hyper-scale web serving. IBM will exclusively use Power9 in its servers and make it available to other hardware companies by licensing the design to them. Power9 processors can be attached directly to various accelerators rather than communicating via the PCIe bus.

Heterogeneous computing approaches for cloud data centres

Fig. 8: Coherent accelerator processor interface

� Proprietary hardware to enable coherent acceleration � Operating system enablement �� - Libcxl function calls � Customer application and accelerator � Application sets up data and calls the �� PCIe and communicates with the application - PSL cache holds coherent data for quick ��

Power8 processor

Fig. 9: CAPI technology connections

basic designs: a 24 SMT4 processor and a 12 SMT8 processor. The 24 SMT4 processor will be optimised for the Linux ecosystem and will target web service companies such as Google, which need to run across several thousand machines. It will feature four threads. The 12 SMT8 processor will be optimised for the Power ecosys42

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tem and will target larger systems designed for running big data or artiﬁcial intelligence (AI) applications. It will feature eight threads. Both designs will come in two models: The scale-out model will come with two CPU sockets on the motherboard, while the scaleup model will come with multiple CPU sockets.

In heterogeneous systems, different kinds of processors—x86 CPUs and FPGAs—cooperate on a computing task. Heterogeneous architectures are already widely used in the mobile world, where ARM CPUs, GPUs, encryption engines and digital signal processing (DSP) cores routinely work together, often on a single die. There are two approaches to establish heterogeneous computing systems in cloud data centres. The ﬁrst approach is based on heterogeneous super nodes that tightly couple compute resources to multi-core CPUs and their coherent memory system via high-bandwidth, low-latency interconnects like CAPI or NVLink. CAPI is encapsulated by the PCIe and appears to use the same bus architecture with higher bandwidth capabilities and lower overall latencies. NVLink is a highbandwidth, energy-efﬁcient interconnect that enables ultra-fast communication between the CPU and GPU, and between GPUs. The technology allows data sharing at speeds ﬁve to twelve times faster than the traditional PCIe Gen 3 interconnect, resulting in dramatic speed-ups in application performance and creating a new WWW.EFYMAG.COM

EMBEDDED breed of high-density, ﬂexible servers for accelerated computing. The second approach is based on the disaggregation of data centre resources where the individual compute, memory and storage resources are connected via the network fabric and can be individually optimised and scaled in line with the cloud paradigm.

(AFU or accelerator). AFU provides applications with a higher computational unit density for customised functions to improve the performance of the application and ofﬂoad the host processor. Use of AFU allows cost-effective processing over a wide range of applications. CAPI can also be used as a base for ﬂash memory expansion, as is the case for

CAPI on Power9

CAPI on Power9 sysDevice Driver Virt Addr Storage Area tem provides a highVariables Variables performance solution Input Input Data Data for implementation of Output Memory Subsystem client-speciﬁc, compuData tation-heavy algorithms 3 versions of the data (not coherent) on an FPGA. It can 1000s of instructions in the device driver replace either application programs running Input on a core or custom acData celeration implementations attached via input/ Fig. 10: Issues with PCI accelerators output (I/O). Applications for CAPI include Monte Carlo algorithms, key value stores and Virtual ﬁnancial and medical Address algorithms. CAPI removes the overhead and Memory Subsystem complexity of the I/O 1 coherent version of the data subsystem, allowing an No device driver call/instructions accelerator to operate as part of an application. A speciﬁc algoInput Data rithm for acceleration is contained in a unit on the FPGA called the accelerator function unit ��

IBM Data Engine for NoSQL Power Systems Edition. The Coherent accelerator processor proxy (CAPP) unit maintains a directory of all cache lines held by the off-chip accelerator, allowing it to act as the proxy that maintains architectural coherence for the accelerator across its virtual memory space. A power service layer (PSL) resides on the FPGA alongside the � Prior to CAPI, an acceleration engine. It application called a device driver to works in concert with utilise an FPGA Accelerator the CAPP unit across a �� The device driver PCIe connection. The performed a memory mapping PSL provides a straightoperation forward command to the FPGA client-written acceleraOutput tor, which grants access Data to coherent memory. The CAPP and PSL handle all virtual-tophysical memory translations, simplifying the programming model and freeing the accelerator to � With CAPI, the do the number crunchFPGA shares memory with ing directly on the data it the cores receives. In addition, the �� Greatly �� PSL contains a 256kB programming model resident cache on behalf of the accelerator. Based FPGA on the needs of the Output algorithm, the acceleraData tor can direct the use of the cache via the type of memory accesses (read/ write) as cacheable or non-cacheable. While

Typical PCIe Model Flow: Total ~13µs for data prep Copy or Pin Source Data

DD Call

300 Instructions

MMIO Notify Accelerator

10,000 Instructions

Acceleration

Application Dependent, but Equal to Below

��

Poll/Interrupt Completion

3000 Instructions

�� Result Data

1000 Instructions

�� Completion

1000 Instructions

��

Flow with a Coherent Model: Total 0.36µs �� Notify Accelerator

��

Acceleration

Shared Memory Completion

Application Dependent, but Equal to Above

100 Instructions ��

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EMBEDDED

Fig. 13: FFTW (Fastest Fourier Transform in the West) on heterogeneous compute nodes Fig. 15: Standalone FPGA accelerator

Fig. 14: Latency

the application executes on the host processor, the CAPI model ofﬂoads computation-heavy functions to the accelerator. The accelerator is a full peer to the application. It uses an unmodiﬁed virtual address with full access to the application’s address space. It uses the processor’s page tables directly with page faults handled by system software. For a CAPI solution, the application might set up the data for the AFU. The application sends the AFU a process element to initiate the data-intensive execution. The process element contains a work element descriptor (WED) provided by the application. The WED can contain the full description of the job to be performed or a pointer to other main memory structures in the application’s memory space. The application can be the master or the slave to the accelerator—whichever mechanism is demanded by the algorithm. Alternatively, the accelerator can receive incoming packets from the network, work on the data, and then 46

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inform the application that the processed data is ready for consumption. The acceleration platform can be integrated into cloud-based services. In this case, the application on the core runs as an Application as a Service (AaaS) for other applications that require services of the accelerator. The AaaS model maintains work queues for the accelerator on behalf of each of the requesting threads and performs any maintenance function needed to inform the accelerator of pending work. These connections are made through operating-system kernel extensions and library functions created speciﬁcally for CAPI. Operating-system kernel extensions will be made available to all Power-Linux Little Endian distributions starting with Canonical’s Ubuntu. When the system boots with a CAPI device connected on a PCIe port, kernel extensions recognise the CAPI device. These perform personalised system initialisations, including conﬁguration of the CAPP unit connection to the PCIe port.

Additional kernel extensions perform maintenance, system protection and communication functions. The client application uses a CAPI library called ‘libcxl,’ which provides multiple functions for the application to connect, call, communicate and disconnect with an available CAPI device. libcxl calls include many basic functions, such as those that allow the application to provide the virtual storage address of data structures to the accelerator. It also provides a memory-mapped I/O interface for the application to read/write registers in the accelerator’s register space on the FPGA. Prior to CAPI, an application calls the device driver to utilise the FPGA accelerator. The device driver performs a memory mapping operation. CAPI connects a custom acceleration engine to the coherent fabric of the Power9 chip. Because FPGAs are reconﬁgurable, hardware can be customised without the traditional costs of hardware fabrication. A standalone appliance/accelerator is equipped with an FPGA, (optional) local memory and an integrated network controller interface (iNIC).The iNIC enables the FPGA to hook itself to the network and to communicate with other DC resources, such as servers, disks, I/O and other FPGA appliances. (To be continued next month) WWW.EFYMAG.COM

TECH FOCUS

3D PRINTING Quickens Manufacturing, Customises Healthcare, And More

T Janani Gopalakrishnan Vikram is a technically-qualified freelance writer, editor and handson mom based in Chennai

here is a lot you can do with a 3D printer. You can create doll houses and toys for your children, or decorative objects for your home. You can print chocolate in various shapes. Real food, like pizzas, can be printed in outer space, auto components can be economically and quickly printed, and limbs and other implants hastily created. Although most 3D printers are custom-made or sold with a heavy price tag today, things are on the verge of changing. In the coming years, a 3D printer will become one of those objects that we will own—simply because it does exciting things! How exciting? That’s the question we attempt to answer now.

Made for space, in space

Made in Space’s Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF) �� manufacturing service in space (Courtesy: Made in Space Inc.)

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Building things in outer space is a huge challenge as spaceships cannot carry the weight of equipment along with the raw materials. The way out is to 3D print all the stuff in outer space itself. Californiabased Made in Space (MIS) has shown that it is possible. MIS owns and operates the Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF)—a fullyfunctional 3D printing set-up that reached the International Space Station (ISS) in

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

March 2016, and has since been producing various parts for MIS’ customers. But, why would one want to produce parts in outer space? The company believes that the space environment is unique, with its persistent microgravity and vacuum conditions. Manufacturing and assembling components in space widens design possibilities and enables one to extend the life of existing on-orbit assets or entirely new structures. Take the example of optical ﬁbre. The company claims that when exotic optical ﬁbre is produced in a strong gravitational environment, such as Earth, it is subject to some ﬂaws. Tiny crystals appear in the ﬁbre and signiﬁcantly increase signal loss. According to them, “In space, ZBLAN optical ﬁbre can be produced without these crystals, providing superior data transmission capabilities compared to both Earth-produced ZBLAN and traditional silica ﬁbre optic lines. This microgravityproduced ﬁbre has numerous applications, including transatlantic telecommunications, high-speed Internet, lasers, as well as enhancing technologies in space.” MIS proved the possibility by launching a miniature ﬁbre-pulling machine called MIS Fiber, with a payload of ZBLAN preforms supplied by Thorlabs. After being set-up on the ISS, MIS Fiber, remotely operated from Earth, successfully produced high valueto-mass ZBLAN ﬁbre. It returned to Earth with its produce. As a next step, MIS is now developing Archinaut, which adds robotic arms to their manufacturing set-up so that the parts produced can also be assembled in space. This can be used to build new structures or to repair existing satellites and other space structures. 3D printing in space has some palatable uses too. BeeHex, a startWWW.EFYMAG.COM

TECH FOCUS up funded by NASA, has developed a 3D printer that can print pizzas with edible ink. Astronauts need to choose the size, dough, topping and cheese, and the printer gets to work depositing layer after layer of ‘ink’ to create a pizza which is then baked in a 400-degree pizza oven. The pizza gets ready quite fast with minimal user intervention, so the company hopes that eateries on Earth will also utilise their tech!

cal as injection moulding. So, it is likely to be used only for customised parts. However, when it comes to printing metal parts, it could be a game changer. At CES 2017, Greg Mark, CEO of Markforged, showed off the Metal X desktop printer, which can print us-

The ultimate in JIT inventory Moving beyond the hobbyists’ zone, 3D printing is now well-rooted in industrial spaces too. The ability to manufacture the required parts just when these are needed could mean the next generation of just-intime (JIT) inventory management. Automakers and others would no longer have to depend on vendors to meet their commitments. Volkswagen Autoeuropa, an automobile manufacturing facility, has seen such beneﬁts by using Ultimaker’s desktop 3D printers to produce custom tools and parts, like gauges, jigs and ﬁxtures. This is just a desktop 3D printer and not a large-scale industrial one, yet the beneﬁts are clear. In a press report, Autoeuropa shared how they were able to 3D print a wheel-protection jig for around $20. Had they gone to a vendor, the process could have cost more than $850. By printing around a thousand parts, they claim to have saved $160,000 in 2016. Apart from reducing cost and improving customisation and productivity, 3D printing allows unlimited and on-demand design revisions, faster lead times and increased accessibility. Since only desktop 3D printers have been used by Volkswagen, the investment is quite low compared to the savings. It is also easy for workers to learn, and quite scalable. When it comes to mass manufacture of plastic parts, experts feel that 3D printing is not as economiWWW.EFYMAG.COM

Markforge’s Metal X 3D printer can print metal parts overnight (Courtesy: Markforge)

ing metals like 17-4 stainless steel, 303 stainless steel, 6061 aluminium, 7075 aluminium, A-2 tool steel, D-2 tool steel, IN alloy (Inconel) 625 and titanium Ti-6Al-4V. The designs are printed in metal powder surrounded by plastic, then the plastic is dissolved and the metal sintered, leaving behind a strong metal part. Metal X uses a technology called Atomic Diffusion Additive Manufacturing (ADAM), which, the company says, is at the intersection of 3D ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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TECH FOCUS Additionally, achieving the oxygen objects are then machined to printing and metal injection mouldbalance in the powder is easier, ﬁnal speciﬁcations. ing, and blends high part quality more efﬁcient and more effective Prodways has tested the platform with complex available geometries from the start and throughout the with a variety of metals, focusing and high density. Rapid sintering ustitanium powder lifecycle. on titanium for use in aerospace aping a microwave furnace speeds up The industry is already keen to plications. It claims that the method the printing process. put Carpenter’s titanium powder to can produce parts without porosity Metal X is expected to be availgood use. Carpenter has partnered and with greater mechanical resistable in markets later this year. The with 3D printing start-up Desktop ance than methods like selective company plans to continue working Metal to provide the powders for laser melting and electron beam on ADAM technology in the future, use inside its material cartridges. melting. The current prototype can incorporating it into a line-up of Other companies like OR even more affordable and Laser, PyroGenesis and scalable printers, with the GKN Hoeganaes are also ‘blade server’ concept for working on the producvolume manufacturing tion of metal powders for where printers on a rack 3D printing. The aerospace will scale up or down to industry is expected to be meet customers’ needs, a key consumer of these as they do in current powders, as it warms up to server farms. the idea of using 3D printed General Electric is metal parts. working towards building According to news the world’s largest laserreports, Russia’s nuclear enpowered 3D printer to ergy corporation, Rosatom, make parts out of metal is also moving towards powder. This printer is using an advanced metal bound to be useful for a prototype of GE’s new printer, can 3D print objects up to 1m long additive manufacturing automotive, power, oil and Atlas, in at least two directions, using titanium, aluminium and other metals technology to produce 3D gas, and other sectors. (Courtesy: Concept Laser) printed parts for the nuclear The company plans to sector. Their industrial metal 3D print parts of over 70cm in size, but showcase a prototype of the printer, printer uses layer-by-layer selective the ﬁnal version is likely to print called Atlas, in November this year. laser melting, with metallic powders objects as large as 2m. The printer can print objects up to based on iron, titanium, aluminium, In June, Carpenter Technology 1m in two directions (length and nickel, cobalt, etc. Others like GE Corporation announced the width) using titanium, aluminium Hitachi Nuclear Energy and Dassault availability of their new Puris 5+ and other metals. So, automotive Systems are also working towards titanium powder for 3D metal manufacturers would be able to 3D printed parts for nuclear plants. printing. Made from TI-6AL-4V manufacture an entire engine block grade 5 titanium, the custom alloy for a car or truck. The production enables maximum reusability with- Breakthroughs in medicine version is likely to be launched and healthcare out compromising on strength. It next year. has an excellent strength-to-weight The Prodways Group, a French Titanium is being used increasingly ratio and biocompatibility, and player, has also announced a by different companies to print hearcan withstand temperatures up to new 3D metal printing technoling aids, vertebrae, spinal interbody 800°C. However, what experts beogy called Rapid Additive Forging devices, hip and jaw implants, etc. lieve to be a signiﬁcant differentia(RAF) that can produce largeRecently, somebody even developed tor is the alloy’s oxygen balance. If scale metal parts. RAF is a type a mini-plate implant system to ﬁx a a metal powder is exposed to too of directed energy deposition that person’s drooping eye. much oxygen, it gets contaminated prints metal within an inert gas In yet another development, and rendered unﬁt for reuse. But, chamber, using a robot with a SI-BONE received FDA approval for Carpenter’s CTO claims in a press metal deposition head. The metal its iFuse-3D implant, supposedly the report that their metal alloy progets deposited layer by layer, enaﬁrst 3D printed titanium implant for vides simultaneous optimisation of bling near-net-shape objects to use in the sacroiliac (SI) joint. The powder recyclability and strength. be printed in a few hours. These implant is placed between the ilium 56

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TECH FOCUS and sacrum bones on each side of the pelvis. SI-BONE has developed a proprietary 3D printing technology in order to develop the implant. The implant features an enhanced porous surface that resembles the trabeculur structure of cancellous bone and a unique fenestrated design; both of these features combine to make an environment that promotes bone ongrowth, ingrowth, through growth and intra-articular fusion. The fenestrated structure and surface were speciﬁcally designed to promote intra-articular fusion and offer enhanced osteointegration. Similarly, Additive Orthopaedics has received FDA clearance for its 3D printed minimally-invasive, intramedullary Bunion Correction System that helps to address alignment and stabilisation of bunions. According to a doctor, this 3D printed implant enables certain features in plates, which cannot be achieved through standard manufacturing processes. For example, one area of the plate can be made to provide additional ﬁxation and strength, to enable the bone to grow onto and through the plate over time. This will support better integration and alignment of bones following a bunion procedure. Johnson & Johnson, one of the popular names in healthcare, has tied up with companies like Organovo and HP to evaluate the use of 3D bio-printed tissues and other 3D printed healthcare solutions. They have also collaborated with Inkbit, a start-up spun out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which has come up with a unique multi-material 3D printing technology to print complex consumer products with integrated electronics. In April this year, the group also acquired the 3D printing technology from Tissue Regeneration Systems Inc (TRS), to create patient-speciﬁc, bioresorbable implants with a unique WWW.EFYMAG.COM

mineral coating. These implants can be used to support bone healing in patients with orthopaedic and craniomaxillofacial deformities and injuries. In June this year, a team of researchers at the Boston University College of Engineering revealed a potential treatment for ischemia using a cell-infused 3D printed patch that can guide the growth of new blood vessels. The team tied up with a Boston-based biomedical tech company called Innolign to 3D

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner will be the ﬁrst commercial airplane to ﬂy with a certiﬁed, structural, 3D printed titanium part! print vessels on a small scale of 100 microns. The cells had to be infused into the patches in a particular pattern in order to be effective, and that is where 3D printing proved its worth. The inherent ﬂexibility of 3D printing allowed the team to change and test their designs, helping them to discern which patterns worked best. 3D printing also offers them the scalability needed to test their designs in larger, more complex organisms and tissue environments in the future.

From shoes to electronics, everything can be 3D printed A four-year-old company called Carbon has come up with a photochemical process that uses light and oxygen to produce objects from pools of liquid polymer. This enables faster printing, greater structural integrity and better consistency than conventional methods. The technology is based on stereolithography (SL). Objects are constructed layer by layer by shining a light into a pool ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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TECH FOCUS of resin and then hardened into the desired shape. In SL methods, after each layer is printed, the object has to be lifted a microscopic level off the build plate to add another layer. This makes the process slow. On the other hand, Carbon uses a clear, contact lens-like window in the resin pool, which is permeable to light and oxygen. According to the company, this creates a carefully choreographed balance between the light, which hardens the resin, and oxygen, which inhibits hardening. As a result, the object is created continually, without the need to add layers. This also makes it possible to create truly isotropic objects, which have same characteristics on all three axes. Adidas has tied up with Carbon to produce lightweight and durable midsoles for its 4D line of athletic sneakers. In June, the Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute (KERI) announced the development of a 3D printing technology capable of printing highly-conductive multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWNTs), which will be very useful in wearables, ﬂexible displays and other such applications. The meniscus-guided 3D printing of highly-conductive MWNT microarchitectures exploits rapid solidiﬁcation of a ﬂuid ink meniscus formed by pulling a micronozzle. The team has designed a polyvinylpyrrolidone-wrapped MWNT ink with uniform dispersion in order to achieve smooth 3D printing without any nozzle clogging. This technique gives scientists a lot of control over the printing process, and can be used to print a variety of microstructures with a high concentration of MWNTs. Optomec, another global leader in 3D printers, has two unique technologies up its sleeve—Aerosol Jet and LENS. Aerosol Jet is used to 3D print electronics at the micron level, while LENS is a metal printing solution that can be added to computer numerically controlled (CNC) WWW.EFYMAG.COM

machining systems. Aerosol Jet is an additive manufacturing process that works with a variety of dielectric, conductive, semiconductor and biological inks. It uses aerodynamic focusing to accurately deposit electronic inks onto substrates, printing features ranging from 10 microns to millimetres. The robotics industry is also an avid user of 3D printing technology. Nanoracing is a two-year-old startup that makes mini racing drones. Their drones are 3D printed, with absolutely no screws or joints. All the electronic parts ﬁt perfectly into a cavity in the drone. In an interview with Sculpteo, a company that 3D prints Nanoracing drones, one of the co-founders of Nanoracing explained that 3D printing is an outstanding tool for prototyping and short-run production. “That’s what we offered our ﬁrst clients: an early bird short run of 320 products. And for us, 3D printing allowed us to do the tests, the crash tests, and adapt the product. All of this while avoiding the costs and delays that go along with injection moulding: rheology tools, moulds, injection, and the validations between each step.” Another robotic venture worth a look is InMoov—an open-source, life-size robot made with 3D printed components and controlled by Arduino microcontrollers. Although it is now around ﬁve years old, it continues to excite the community. It’s amazing because you can download the designs and print your own robot too if you have access to a 3D printer! Indeed, 3D printing opens up a world of opportunities, for everybody and every industry. In India, it might still be too costly for you to own your own 3D printer. However, costs are going down. There are 3D printers like the da Vinci Mini that are priced around ` 40,000, and organisations can invest in these for learning and innovation. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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DESIGN

How To Reduce Size And Weight Of PULSE LOAD POWER SUPPLY here are a number of electronics devices that require clear, pulsed power supply. For instance, power consumption of contemporary high-performance processor devices directly depends on the dynamic load of the processor and can vary over a very wide range within a short time. Apart from this, transceiver equipment consumes the most power in transmit-

T Oleg Negreba is Head of R&D, AEDON

(a) Conventional PSU

Fig. 1: Transient output voltage deviation of two different PSUs. Nominal output voltage 50 VDC. Step change of load 0W-340W0W. Scale: Vertical 5V/div, horizontal - 10ms/div

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(b) PSU with fast voltage feedback

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ting mode, while in receiving mode there is virtually no load on the equipment. Such dynamics of load puts quite strict requirements in the output power quality of power supplies with step-change nature of output current. Limited voltage feedback speed of power supply units (PSUs) requires capacitive accumulators to be installed between them and the dynamic load. At the same time, you can see an unambiguous dependence between dynamic characteristics of a source and the value of a necessary capacitance accumulator. It is evident that slow feedback requires a larger capacitance accumulator, which increases the weight and dimensions of the complete power supply system. The miniaturisation trend in electronics makes it necessary to increase the operating speed of power supplies to reduce the size of capacitance accumulator with the same quality of power supply to the load. Given that, it is reasonable to use PSUs with very fast voltage feedback. This will reduce the number of capacitors required, and in some cases completely elimiWWW.EFYMAG.COM

DESIGN

Fig. 2. Waveform chart of output voltage transition deviation of a PSU with fast voltage feedback during load power surge between 0 and 340W (scale: vertical 0.5V/div, horizontal 100µs/div)

their speciﬁcations also make them a suitable product for other systems with pulse nature of load. They can be used to build fully decentralised power supply systems. Fig. 3 shows an example of such a system. Decentralised power supply is a system where each consumer is supplied by its own relatively lowpower supply unit, which, in turn, is supplied directly from the on-board mains, power generator or any other input power supply, ensuring the maximum reliability of the system as a whole. If a fuse is put at the input of each unit, in case of failure the broken cell will automatically disconnect from the input mains. Thus failure of one of the cells or its power supply will not affect other consumer operations and will not break the complete system. Thanks to such decentralisation, communication electronics becomes invulnerable compared to a centralised system, where reliability depends on one powerful source supplying power to all consumers. Apart

ble due to very fast voltage feedback nate them. This, in turn, will lower of the PSU (in less than 100µs, as the weight and size of the complete shown in Fig. 2). power supply system. Such PSUs are particularly useThe output voltage quality of ful for transceiver units of active different PSUs supplying pulse-type phased-array radars (AESA). But load can be evaluated by the waveform chart of transient output voltage deviation Unit 1 FU1 C1 C9 C17 Load 1 Power-good +Input +Output at step change of load +Supply diagnostic and control device Input Common –Input –Output power. Fig. 1 shows waveFilter MAINS Case form charts of the output PGOOD 1 PGOOD Power On Power on 1 power of a conventional Sync 1 PSU (a) compared to a Sync 2 similar PSU with fast voltage feedback and (b) durUnit 2 FU2 C2 C10 C18 Load 2 +Input +Output +Supply ing load power transients Common –Input –Output within the range from Case zero to maximum. Output PGOOD 2 PGOOD Power on 2 Power On voltage transient deviation Sync 1 of the conventional unit is Sync 2 +5%/–35%, while output voltage transient deviation of the PSU with fast voltage feedback is ±2.4%. Unit 8 FU8 C8 C16 C27 Load 8 These waveform charts +Input +Output +Supply show that in the same Common –Input –Output conditions at load power Case PGOOD 8 PGOOD fall and surge the transient Power On 8 Power On deviation of the output Sync Sync 1 Common Sync 2 voltage of different PSUs can vary approximately 15 times. That becomes possi- Fig. 3. Example of a decentralised power supply system with galvanically connected output voltages 62

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DESIGN from this, centralisation of power supply usually leads to a higher voltage drop at connection circuits. That is a result of supplying larger power at the input and further remoteness of consumers at the output, which makes it necessary to use wires of larger cross-section. A decentralised power supply system has lower powers transferred inside, while the power supply units can be located close to their consumers. Thus it minimises dynamic instabilities of the voltage. Another advantage of power supply units for decentralised systems is their uniﬁed character, i.e., these can be used in power supply systems of different devices, unlike high-power systems, which are usually unique and can be used for one type of equipment only. If a decentralised system uses PSUs with output current higher than pulse current of the supplied load, the speciﬁc drop of output voltage in the end of the operating pulse will be fully eliminated in this case. First, this feature eliminates the need to use large capacitance accumulators for power supply to the load during the complete power consumption pulse, retaining the minimum capacitance to ensure the required voltage quality during the transition process in the front and rise of load pulse. Second, as the mode of nominal power of the converter corresponds to its maximum efﬁciency, thermal losses of the complete power supply system are minimised. Third, in case of AESA transceivers, which usually have pulse off-duty factor of less than 5, the comfortable thermal mode of the unit itself is supported. An important advantage of a PSU with fast voltage feedback is galvanically isolated differential synchronisation input. This allows frequency synchronisation of several simultaneously operating units and ensures reliable hardware and software ﬁltration of electromagnetic interference of converters. High conversion frequency not only positively impacts the weight and dimensions of the units but also allows to isolate in different ranges the operating frequency area of the AESA transceiver equipment and units’ switching noise. When selecting a power supply unit with fast voltage feedback, it is important to consider small dimensions as well as the ability to operate within as wide a temperature range as possible, which sometimes can reach -60 to +125°. Other important functions may include remote on/off, protection against overcurrent, short-circuit and over-voltage, as well as output voltage fault monitoring. Polymer potting sealing ensures strong protection of the units against damage from harsh environments, vibration, dirt, moisture or salt mist. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

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DESIGN

Ensuring LOWER THERMAL DISSIPATION For Higher E�ciency

A

renowned manufacturing ﬁrm incurred heavy monetary losses when clients returned 5000 units of its LED lights after discovering that the supplied units failed within a few hours of usage. On investigation, development engineers at the ﬁrm found heat dissipation issues with MOSFET and SMPS, which were not taken care of during the design stage. The excessive heat led to the LEDs’ failure.

heat dissipation. Components fail when these operate at temperatures exceeding the thermal level or junction temperature threshold.

Upcoming innovations

PCB manufacturers have been looking at various ways to reduce heat dissipation from their PCB boards, and make the end Vertica Asthana products efﬁcient as well as durable. is a technical journalist at EFY To reduce thermal dissipation, a few Heat dissipation causes upgrades have been introduced—from power supply and PCB routing to transThe design of a system, coupled with former and MOSFET manufacturing, and judicial use of components, is crucial as it from solar cells in a panel to batteries determines the product’s efﬁciency, and, in in vehicles. turn, thermal dissipation. Power supply. Hrishikesh Kamat, CEO, Pratik Mukherjee, vice-president (techShalaka Technologies, says, “The design nology), SAR Group, recalls an incident consideration, including the placement where they had designed a sine-wave and calculative use of components, has a inverter with a totally different topology huge impact on thermal dissipation.” from other inverters. As the design was very Smartphone makers such as Micromax sound, the company reaped its beneﬁts and are ditching the traditional way of reduccontinues to do so even today. Although ing thermal dissipation. For instance, in Mukherjee had to face a lot of criticism a mobile charger, a small and compact for the long time taken for its research and device, the voltage step-down process is development, the product turned out to be a followed by rectiﬁcation to substantially milestone for the company. reduce heat dissipation. Traditionally, the System over-usage and several applicarectiﬁcation process preceded voltage steptions running simultaneously also affect down in capacitive circuits, thus generatthermal dissipation. In a multi-functional ing a larger amount of heat. design, several components of a system Kamat informs, “Most smartphone work simultaneously, which not only afmakers are using this technique to bypass fects the other GaN is about to create the possibility heat issues, while a few are resorting to the components but for new markets to emerge use of ICs.” also increases Just the way it worked for Bipolar in the 80’s ...for MOSFET and SJ MOSFET in 1990’s Conor Quinn, technical mar...for IGBT in the 2000’s keting senior director, Artesyn Embedded Technologies, says, “Many of today’s power supplies use switching devices like MOSFETs or gate drivers, which are supplied in IC-style packages. Bipolar Transistor SJ MOSFET Most ICs have in-built thermal MOSFET GaN Transistor IGBT SiC MOSFET protection and cut-off at a certain temperature before it hits the Fig. 2: Skive, Zipper heat-sink (Image Fig. 1: GaN MOSFET (Image courtesy: www.pntpower.com) junction point.” �� 64

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DESIGN In this quest, they have Both MOSFETs and transcome up with lithium polyformers are being modiﬁed mer batteries, which will be to improve their impact on a boon to the industry and heat dissipation. For inconsumers alike. These batstance, most power elecHeat in Heat out teries support innumerable tronics manufacturers have charge/discharge cycles, and started using gallium-nitride will ﬁnd application in mobile MOSFETs, which allow improducts and electric cars. proved thermal dissipation �� Wicking liquid Lithium polymer batterdue to high efﬁciency. Being �� ies use polymer electrolyte used in high-frequency �� instead of liquid electrolyte. systems, these MOSFETs are www.researchgate.net) Their composition is such taking the market by storm. that it improves heat dissiB.C. Bharadwaj, owner of High Temperature Protection Lower RDS(on) MOSFETs Design GIGABYTE motherboards use Low pation, even during chargVedang Radio, informs that RDS(on) MOSFETs which reduce ing and discharging of the they are also using galliumenergy wastage through unnecessary residual heat dissipation. This all battery. However, the cost nitride FET in their RF Lower RDS(on) MOSFET Design amounts to tangible energy savings �� Traditional MOSFET Design of the battery can be an power ampliﬁers as it helps users and the environment without impacting system performance. issue as, Kamat says, these to dissipate the heat well. batteries will be four times Besides, MOSFETs with ��ON �� costlier than the existing low drain-to-source resistlithium-ion batteries. ance (Rds ON) are now Solar cells. A solar panel available for inverter appliSoftware for heat calculation is a system made from incations. The lower the value Although thermal dissipation is monitored using a calculated numerable solar cells, which of Rds ON, the lesser the design, software like FloTherm, Ansys or SolidWorks are are basically diodes. During power losses, which increasadditional tools put to use. conduction stage, these dies the inverter efﬁciency. odes emit heat, which affects Mukherjee says, “The the efﬁciency of the end-product. Battery-run products. PCB Rds ON value of the modiﬁed To resolve the heat dissipation manufacturers are coming up with MOSFETs is one-fourth the earlier issue, solar panel designers have ways to improve the efﬁciency of versions’. These MOSFETs are beswitched from silicon to cadmiumbattery-run products by decreasing used in inverters of SAR Group telluride in solar cells, which has ing the heat generated. One such as well.” increased their voltage range, thus product is e-rickshaw, which will Transformers. Transformer is ensuring lesser heat dissipation and soon be running on lithium polymer the heart of a design. The transhigher efﬁciency. batteries as design engineers ensure former design affects the topology “Solar cells are following the better thermal dissipation mechaof the circuit design. For example, a industry standards, which claim nism in these batteries. transformer with ﬂyback topology This can be explained better with around 17.3 per cent efﬁciency for would increase the efﬁciency of a each cell,” says Mukherjee. ‘cranking phenomenon,’ in which a 50W LED bulb by reducing thermal system starting with the power of a dissipation considerably. Neglecting thermal issues: battery draws huge current initially, Heat-sinks. Heat-sinks are mea costly mistake thus generating thermal stress in the chanical parts used in MOSFETs, ICs system. This is the current concept and diodes. These are mostly made The rise in heat can crash the expenin products such as e-rickshaws. of aluminium, which is cheaper and sive design or reduce the lifespan of Besides, battery weight and efﬁlighter than copper. the components or the system. More ciency are also being worked upon to Thin metal sheet-based zipper heat dissipation indicates ﬂaws in combat thermal dissipation. Designheat-sinks are the new kids on the the design as it is not able to maners are working towards reducing block. These are light in weight, and age heat issues. Realising this, dethe dead-weight of the battery (the have a perfect proﬁling for proper signers across sectors are constantly weight of the charged battery), thus heat dissipation. High ﬁn density working towards reducing thermal improving battery efﬁciency and life. results in less surface area with imdissipation in their products, thus The higher the efﬁciency, the lesser proved properties. These heat-sinks making their products efﬁcient and will be heat dissipation issues. are reliable and cost-effective too. long-lasting. 66

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INNOVATION FROM WORKPLACE TO GARDEN JANANI GOPALAKRISHNAN VIKRAM

Uniﬁed threat management at work, at home Measuring just 7.5×2.7×2.1cm3, this �� store up to 2TB

Store up to 2TB in a ﬂash drive The world was surprised when thumb drives came with capacities greater than a gigabyte. What would you say now that Kingston has come out with terabyte-capacity USB ﬂash drives? Kingston’s DataTraveler Ultimate GT comes in 1TB and 2TB capacities, each priced at around a thousand dollars. If you need to backup large production ﬁles on the go or take along a 4K or 8K RAW video footage, it is deﬁnitely worth investing in. USB 3.1 Gen 1 improves the performance by up to ten times while also providing better power management. This makes DataTraveler much faster than traditional external hard drives. A small footprint of 7.5×2.7×2.1cm3 and protective zinc alloy metal casing make the device handy and robust to carry along. Although made for USB Type-C ports, these ﬂash drives also work with the USB 2.0 and 3.0 Type-A ports commonly found on PCs, tablets and other devices. The high-capacity ﬂash drive is ideal to use with Android devices that support USB OTG (On-The-Go). So users can quickly access, edit and transfer ﬁles without any performance lag. Apart from regular versions available for sale, the company provides the option to customise drives for orders greater than 100 units. You can design the casing, logo and other aspects, or pre-store some content on the drives. Product: Kingston DataTraveler Ultimate GT 2TB; Company: Kingston; Website: http://www.kingston. com/us/usb/personal_business/dtugt; Country: United States of America 68

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

With an increase in the number of connected devices (the Internet of Things or IoT), users are under constant threat from cyber criminals even at home. From identity theft to break-ins, a lot of mishaps can arise out of loopholes in your home network’s cyber security. Fortress Cyber Security offers a way out with its home-focused, enterprisegrade uniﬁed threat management (UTM) solution. This software stack and hardware solution allows users to deploy several enterprise security technologies at home. It monitors every connection on your home network, detects and prevents intrusions, and blocks bad connections, viruses and ransomware. Fortress maintains a blacklist of cyber security threats and bad actors (or bad apples) on the Internet. This information is distributed to every device on your network. What is interesting about Fortress’ claim is that even if a bad actor manages to get in, he cannot get out of your network. The solution includes a touchscreen appliance, desktop computer portal and mobile app, so you can control the features through whichever medium you prefer, and from anywhere. You can watch and control how the system works, and make the best use of security features like Fortress’ enterprise-grade cyber security for the IoT at browsing protection, parental home (Courtesy: Fortress Cyber Security) controls, command and control blocking, unauthorised access blocking, unauthorised device blocking and network behaviour analysis. Product: Fortress; Company: Fortress Cyber Security; Website: https:// fortresscs.com; Country: United States of America

Connected whiteboard that saves your work If you believe that jotting down ideas infuses much more creativity and focus than digitally representing them, Quirklogic’s Quilla is for you. Positioned as a replacement for whiteboards, Quilla is a combination of a 106cm (42-inch) E-Ink electronic paper display (EPD) and electronic ink technologies, which can be used like a whiteboard and marker! Despite its large size, the Wi-Fi connected device is lightweight enough to carry it around your ofﬁce. Quilla is battery-powered, and despite the device being always-on, a single charge lasts up to 16 hours. There is hardly any glare and you can read content even in bright sunlight. Quilla is very comfortable to use. Simply touch to erase, resize, copy or move content. Your page is not limited by the edges of the device. You can simply span and continue adding content. It is also possible to import images and PDFs to review

Quilla is like a whiteboard that enables real-time collaboration (Courtesy: Quirklogic)

and annotate. Content written on the board is immediately saved in the user’s library. This enables both personalisation and collaboration. You can access your content from anywhere and start off where you left. Likewise, you can connect multiple devices from different locations, to share work and collaborate in real time, from anywhere. Product: Quilla; Company: Quirklogic; Website: https://www.quirklogic. com; Country: Canada WWW.EFYMAG.COM

INNOVATION

Laser distance measurer capable of problem solving Designing a physical space is complex and tedious due to the measurements and calculations involved. You need to get all the dimensional parameters together, calculate the relative placement, ﬁnd the right design, re-calculate and re-measure to map those design points to the actual physical space. If you have it wrong, it is back to the measurements again. Plott has come out with a device that can simplify these tasks for you. Cubit is their ﬁrst attempt at a tool that can think and solve problems. Equipped with dual lasers and a smart wheel, it aims to free users from the tedium of making complex measurements and the innumerable calculations needed for layout placement. So you can focus on the goal of the project and plan the journey accordingly. Cubit will do the rest! Cubit can measure distances up to 30.5 metres (100 feet), with an accuracy of 2mm. The built-in wheel is used to measure short distances and irregular shapes. The app combines these measurements with photos of the physical space. You can virtually design your project with real-world scale and context, download and incorporate designs from the Web, and share your design with others to collaborate. When you actually get down to implementing the design in the real Cubit looks like a simple tape measure but it’s a world, Cubit guides you to your meassmart tool that bridges the gap between design urements using directional arrows. A and construction (Courtesy: Plott) bulls-eye maps the points you created digitally to the real physical space. So you just need to walk around with Cubit to ﬁgure out where you need to place stuff or perform construction tasks. No more complex calculations and errors! A feedback process correlates the completed place with the original, so you can see how it has changed. Product: Cubit; Company: Plott; Website: http://letsplott.com/cubit; Country: United States of America

A weeding robot from the maker of Roomba Franklin Robotics is well-known as the maker of Roomba—the house cleaning robot. Now, they are all set to give you a garden cleaning solution too! The new robot, called Tertill, automatically and constantly weeds your garden. There have been tech solutions for weeding before, but what makes Tertill special is that it works autonomously. It stays in your garden—rain or shine—and charges with solar power. It uses no chemicals, so it is easy to go the organic way with Tertill. The robot keeps patrolling your garden looking for weeds. Its sensors help it to detect and steer away from plants. Small plants are considered as weeds and pulled out using string trimmers and weed whackers. To prevent Tertill from accidentally pulling out young saplings, you can ﬁt these 70

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Tertill solar-powered robot to weed your garden

with plant collars till they grow to a particular height, when these are out of danger. Armed with special proprietary algorithms, Tertill patrols the garden in such a way that it can ﬁnd and get rid of maximum weeds in an effective way. Product: Tertill; Company: Franklin Robotics; Website: http://www.franklinrobotics.com; Country: United States of America

A non-messy, sure-shot indoor garden for your home or workplace (Courtesy: Winmart Design)

A smart indoor garden that’s sure to grow Adding a green touch to your workplace improves not just the ambience but productivity too. Plants are wonderful to have at home as well. But, not everybody has a green thumb! The LeGrow Smart Garden ensures that you have a nice collection of indoor plants that grow well. At the heart of LeGrow’s solution are the modular desk planters. You can click together the planters like Lego blocks and make an interesting indoor garden. The pot is designed with an internal water reservoir, which captures the excess water. This not only avoids spilling and leakage but also retains the moisture, so you do not have to water the plants frequently. The LeGrow Shine plant growth lamp contains two light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs that turn on or off to provide the right intensity and brightness of light for the plants to grow well. Apart from this, the ecosystem also includes LeGrow Spring air puriﬁer and humidiﬁer that provides the plants with ideal humidity conditions. The solution comes with a handy power pot with four USB ports, which powers the humidiﬁer, light source and two more of your devices. The Smart Garden is available in different conﬁgurations that include different number of modules such as planters, power pot, humidiﬁer and lights. You can pick the option that ﬁts your needs best. The company accepts orders through Kickstarter (https://www. kickstarter.com/projects/1413554510/ legrow-the-smart-indoor-garden-forany-space?token=414d6b22). Product: LeGrow Smart Garden; Company: Winmart Design; Website: https://winmartdesign.com; Country: Singapore WWW.EFYMAG.COM

INNOVATION

BETTY: The Super Power To Save Power

E Paromik Chakraborty is a technical journalist at EFY

lectricity bills form a major part of ofﬁce and household running costs. For organisations, average electricity consumption accounts for 19 per cent of the running expenditure. Traditionally, in India meter readings are taken manually, which quite often end up as ‘round-off’ or ‘approximate’ ﬁgures. Moreover, users do not get to see exactly how they are spending on their electricity and thus ﬁgure out ways to lower the bills. Thankfully, the smart age of connected devices has given us ample new options that inform us about our energy usage and ways to lower it. One such option is Betty by Beyond Evolution, which merits attention due to its affordable price.

The inception

Betty—The energy monitoring and security plug

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Saurabh Sharma, co-founder and CEO of Beyond Evolution, saw the opportunity in controlling the power consumption of everyday appliances and easing the burden of electricity cost for the common man. Quite often users forget to switch off electrical appliances during power cuts, leaving the appliances running when the power resumes. This not only wastes power but also poses ﬁre risk. “Our intent was not to become a so-called ‘home-automation’ solution provider. Betty has been designed for the more common challenges faced by majority of the people. Home automation may indicate a form of luxury, while Betty targets to address the day-to-day necessities,” explains Sharma. The whole thought process kickstarted R&D initiatives, which took 18 months to develop the complete solution. Betty can in-situ measure appliance energy consumption, set auto-control (automatic ‘on’ and ‘off’) schedules as well as electricity usage thresholds, provide energy us-

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

age analytics, and, more interestingly, notify users of any security breach. Being a newcomer in the manufacturing arena, the company had to scale a steep learning curve. Limited funds were another challenge. To start the fund inﬂow, the company kicked off with mobile application development and attracted signiﬁcant customers. Once the production seemed ﬁnancially feasible, they started off with the Betty project. Expensive components added to the trouble. Getting a fair deal from mould providers and coming up with mould designs was also not easy.

Time to talk science Betty is a GSM-enabled 16-ampere monitoring plug-cum-security device, which, when connected to any appliance, helps control it remotely through Be-Connected mobile application or the web application (supporting Android as well as iOS) developed by the company. The solution also provides customers with major consumption data and insights that help them reduce energy wastage, slashing their utility bills and giving them full device control. Betty connects to an input plug-point like any normal plug. The appliance to be used is connected thereafter. When the user logs into Be-Connected mobile application and sets a schedule, the application connects to the cloud server; the company uses Amazon Web Services. The server triggers a command to Betty, which acts accordingly. The Betty circuit primarily consists of an SMPS, a GSM-PCB (comprising majorly a GSM modem, current sensors, motion sensor and a microcontroller) and, ﬁnally, relay sections. When a device is plugged into Betty, the SMPS scales the current in accordance with the device capacity and forwards it to the GSM-PCB. Current sensors in the PCB detect the current consumed and the information is relayed to WWW.EFYMAG.COM

INNOVATION the microcontroller, where calculations take place. The data is calculated in the form of power consumption and currency, and displayed on the mobile application. As wireless connection is established through GSM, the user needs to have a network-enabled SIM card inserted into Betty. The device runs smoothly on 2G speed, so slow network barely affects its functioning. Sharma shares the reason behind the choice of GSM support over Wi-Fi: “India is improving in its Wi-Fi connectivity, but it is still not in the best condition. Even 3G or 4G is not 100 per cent reliable. In comparison, 2G is ever-pervasive. It is available even outdoors.” Once an on/off schedule is set, the information is stored in the server. Even if the mobile application is not working during the schedule, it will not impact the functioning of Betty. The device also has manual control buttons. Even 6-ampere appliances can be handled using a 6A-16A converter. Monitoring data from Betty is consistently stored on the server. In case mobile Internet is not available on Betty’s SIM, the device can locally hold consumption data for up to eight hours, which is displayed to the customer when the network returns. If security mode is selected in the mobile application, the plug’s motion sensors will detect any kind of movement within a 9-metre (30-feet) ra-

Team Betty

dius and instantly trigger an alarm on the user’s mobile application. The application allows user management, i.e., multiple users can have permission to handle the application and functions of Betty. All authorised users will receive notiﬁcations at the same time and get access to the data and controls.

Scheduling helps users to ensure no appliances are running when not in use, saving a lot of energy wastage. Moreover, monitoring helps users understand where they can cut their electricity consumption and also see how much they are saving using Betty. The information through the application enables regular monitoring, planning and better scheduling of Betty, the helper electricity consumption. Scheduling different Beyond Evolution claims Electricity is used eveappliances on the Be-Connected app an average of 12 to 15 per rywhere, so essentially cent electricity cost reducanyone can use and bention using Betty. eﬁt from Betty. The company eyes small and large business ofﬁces, In the market commercial buildings, SMEs as well as home-owners as the target conBetty is already available in the marsumers of Betty. The main beneﬁt ket. It can be purchased from any of Betty and Be-Connected applicamajor online retail site like Amazon, tion is lowered electricity bills and Flipkart, Paytm and Ebay, or from secured premises. the company’s website for ` 2499. The plug-n-play device has no installation hassles, the mobile application What you can do with Betty is user-friendly and self-explanatory, 1. Automate your appliances or control them remotely with your mobile and there is no additional opera2. Know the exact amount of power consumption by the devices in real time. Make tional cost other than the connecinformed decision on areas where consumption might be controlled or cut down tion expenses for the SIM inserted 3. Be notified when power supply is cut off in your premises and when it resumes. Also, in Betty. stay updated when Betty is performing any action Betty is getting positive customer 4. Insert previous current consumption data and get a regular comparative data on power feedbacks—some even reporting up consumption saved using Betty 5. Perform analytics on available data (daily, weekly or monthly) using Be-Connected to ` 1000 savings on their household mobile application electricity bills. The company now 6. Set multiple schedules on different devices through Be-Connected mobile application plans Wi-Fi inclusion and other 7. Keep your home or office safe, and get alarmed or alarm your neighbour in case of upgradations for the device, which a security breach will be rolled out soon.

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SMART WORLD

76 Why Switch to Open Source

78 Keep Stress At Bay with Vehicle Tracking

79 AI Platforms Ready to Deploy

Why Everyone Is Switching To

OPEN SOURCE

� Open source makes tasks easier for businesses and customers alike.

W

hile open source may be just another tech jargon to you, it has transformed operations for many organisations in the past and can intrinsically bring an all-new experience for your company, too. But what is great about open source for your business? Essentially, it is the ease that brings open source to the mainstream, as it makes tasks easier for consumers. Technology giants like Google and Microsoft, network operators such as Bharti Airtel and Vodafone, and social networking sites like Facebook and Google+, all are using open source to grow in the market.

Uniﬁed, proﬁtable model The original model revolved around open source software alone. But 76

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nowadays, hardware and even the cloud have started going the open source way. “It is easier to deploy open source technologies than proprietary ones as these are meant for speciﬁc use-cases,” said Anant Kumar, head of product engineering and IT, Bharti Airtel. Airtel is widely adopting open source developments to expand its position in the Indian telecom sector. Whether it is customer acquisition or optimising the experience for its own call centre agents, the Gurugram-headquartered telco is leveraging open source at all major levels. “Open source has helped us build elastic, scalable systems at low cost and hence increase our productivity,” said Harmeen Mehta, global chief information ofﬁcer, Bharti

Airtel. At present, Airtel entirely depends upon open source for its six important projects and has a team of more than 80 engineers to continually monitor and improve its developments.

Substitutes for proprietary solutions One of the most obvious advantages of open source is its availability as an alternative to proprietary solutions. If you want to switch from Microsoft Ofﬁce to an open source solution, you can ﬁnd not just one or two but plenty of substitutes. There are LibreOfﬁce, Apache OpenOfﬁce and KOfﬁce to give you the closest experience to Microsoft Ofﬁce at no cost. Likewise, if you are looking to abandon your existing proprietary WWW.EFYMAG.COM

SMART WORLD database solution to move to MAJOR CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS REPORT for organisations to consume, an open source alternative, participate in and leverage you have PostgreSQL, MySQL, the external R&D that is open NoSQL and MariaDB among source software,” said Woster, various other options. who helped build the non-proﬁt Chandigarh-based Jugnoo, organisation become a $65 milwhich is among the early open lion entity. source-adopting startups, recentEnterprise-level security Anant Kumar, head Bob Canaway Harmeen Mehta ly moved from Tally and SAP of product engineering CMO, BlackDuck global CIO, ERP to open-sourced Odoo for Despite being low-cost, open and IT, Bharti Airtel Bharti Airtel its HR developments. Co-founder source is a secure solution for and CTO Chinmay Agarwal your operations. “Open source parameter to consider. But this is now plans to shift the company’s enables us to be more lean, agile something that you cannot achieve other business processes also to and secure and, hence, move faster entirely with a proprietary solution. open source. in the competitive world,” said You must move to open source. “We liked the implementation of Kumar of Airtel. “Open source technology gives Odoo for HR, and it will be easy for The team at MakeMyTrip has you the freedom to try, test and us to transition ultimately to Odoo even embraced open source to scale your solution, one step at a for other business processes too,” secure its user experience. time,” said Amit Ranjan, who coAgarwal highlighted. “We leverage various open founded SlideShare and is presently source deployments to manage working at National e-Governance Cost saving security. These have greatly helped Division (NeGD). to enhance our security posture NeGD has developed citizen-ﬁrst The prime beneﬁt of switching to in the market,” revealed Mehta of projects including DigiLocker and open source is cost saving. Online MakeMyTrip. Government e-Market (GeM) using travel company MakeMyTrip that open source technologies. This helps handles its online presence with a Digital transformation the government department to effecmonthly trafﬁc of over 22 million tively offer its solutions to the public Diverse companies, starting from visits considers open source as an and enable scalability with ease. To efﬁcient alternative. Wal-Mart and Salesforce to General date, DigiLocker has provided access Electric and Philips, have begun “At an optimal operating exto over a billion documents online. penditure, we were able to exeradopting open source to digitise All that came from a small in-house cise greater ﬂexibility using open their services for end consumteam of around 14 people from source components on our webers. Analysts thus consider open diverse domains. site,” said Vikram Mehta, senior source as a driver for digital “Our small team is capable of manager for information security, transformation. doing tasks that require hundreds MakeMyTrip. “The use of open source softof engineers. It is all because of Airtel also counts on the efﬁware and solutions is required in the skills that come from the open ciency and ﬂexibility of open source. the model for digital transformasource support,” Ranjan states. “Preferring open source lets us take tion. CIOs and other leaders readily control in order to make our deciembracing open source will ﬁnd External R&D sions smoothly,” Kumar said. that they are better positioned to Kumar considers spending on transform their businesses,” said Among the lifelines of open source, open source technologies virtually Sanjay Gupta, adjunct research advicommunity support comes at the puts zero burden. “If we have to sor, IDC. top. “If a project has an active comtake a licensed product, then its cost “The ability to harness the munity, it will be regularly patched gets multiplied. You can compare collective power of individuals, partand improved,” said Bob Canaway, this with any popular commercial ners and global development comCMO, BlackDuck. solution and get the total saving. It munities provides a transformative In a recent interview with the will be in tunes of crores (tens of lever that is difﬁcult to match. Open IBM team, Linux Foundation CRO millions),” he pronounced. source-based platforms provide this Mike Woster went a step further ability in today’s digital world,” the to describe community-supported Scalable till inﬁnity analyst remarks. open source software as an external R&D for organisations. “It is If you want to grow the presence of —Jagmeet Singh, a key member of Open vastly vastly more advantageous your company, scalability is the ﬁrst Source For You and opensourceforu.com team WWW.EFYMAG.COM

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SMART WORLD

Keep Stress At Bay with Vehicle Tracking Systems � Manage your vehicles better while keeping an eye out for any kind of nuisance like fuel theft.

I

n 2012, Arjun S. Kumar, then 13-year-old school student from Chennai, was caught in a cyclone-induced heavy rain while returning home by the school bus, leaving his parents worried about his whereabouts and wellbeing. To help parents in such situations, the boy later went on to program a mobile application called Locatera, which helps school authorities and parents to track a school bus, get information on the students available in the bus and know whereabouts of the bus at any given time. Interestingly, this app, developed by a school student, has been acknowledged by the government of India, the Massachusetts

School bus tracking solutions (Image courtesy: Pixabay website)

Institute of Technology (MIT) and Google. Fortunately, there are a host of similar solutions available today. Here we talk about a few of them.

Scope of the technology Apart from educational institutions like schools and colleges that provide transport services to their students, transport companies that often partner with hospitality majors can boost their business using bus tracking applications. Creating a brand value. For any player in the transport business, safety is the biggest concern. Thus, when safety is assured, the brand value of the transport company goes several notches up. And this is exactly the USP of this technology. The application helps track a vehicle’s movements in real time— including location, speed, direction and so on. Tabs on the driver’s behavioural patterns like punctuality, driving style and route regulations keep both the company as well as customers informed about the reliability of the driver. In addi-

tion, there are panic buttons to raise emergency alerts. Trans Global Geomatics, a Hyderabad-based ﬂeet management solutions company, has provided a school-bus tracking solution for International School, Kakinada, which manages 40 buses. There were reports of frequent school bus delays during pickup. Additionally, the management suspected fuel theft from the buses, noticing unavailability of the vehicles at times. Trans Global Geomatics provided the school a bus tracking solution, which gave users insight like vehicle idle alert (SMS- and email-based notiﬁcation for every ﬁve-minute halt), realtime bus navigation tracking to monitor the whereabouts of the bus, details on every halt made by the bus throughout the day, and daily pickup and drop-off data. All this data helped the school authority to manage their vehicles better while keeping an eye out for any kind of nuisance like fuel theft. Saving money. Be it an organisation’s own ﬂeet of buses or a thirdparty transport company, cost efﬁciency

Smarter India Internet on Flights Soon in India

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In a year’s time, Indian ﬂyers should be able to access the Internet during their ﬂight— according to BSNL.

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Mobile App for Taxpayers

Titled ‘My Tax,’ the app developed by the Income Tax department is aimed to help taxpayers get all the relevant information and interact with the department too.

Hi-tech Helmets for Indian Army

The Indian Army has received a new lot of high-tech helmets called Commander Helmets, which have an inbuilt communication device and are compatible with different radio sets.

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SMART WORLD is a necessity. Application-based analytics, route consistency monitoring and driver tracking greatly reduce unnecessary expenses. Organisations can monitor hourly paid drivers to avoid over-payment due to driver delays. Route optimisation helps reduce inefﬁcient driving, cutting down fuel expenses. Applications also allow fuel and engine status visibility, so institutions can track unplanned vehicle usage or unaccounted fuel loss. For instance, InnoVita Technologies, a Pune-based vehicle tracking solutions company, has reported up to 15 per cent decrease in the fuel cost for its customers who have incorporated the school bus tracking solution. Better customer services. Bus tracking solutions provide details like estimated time of bus arrival and analytics on driver punctuality, time management and schedule patterns, utilising which organisations can improve their schedules and advise drivers on better time management. Parents can also be pre-informed about the pickup timings. Magnasoft Consulting India cited an example where the transport manager of one of their client schools explained how difﬁcult the bus ﬂeet management was and how challenging it was to address the delays caused by the buses during pickup without a smart system helping them out initially. The integration of a bus tracking solution called Northstar Duo, by Magnasoft, helped the school to keep a constant tab on the bus on-road and also provided in-

India’s Rooftop Solar Capacity Reaches 1396MW

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sight into the pickup timing patterns of the drivers—essentially allowing the school authority to formulate a better pickup schedule, manage the bus timings and get a clear idea of the vehicle whereabouts in real time. Parents receive an automated voice notiﬁcation of the vehicle arrival. Additionally, the school was able to increase the fuel-efﬁciency of its vehicles through route monitoring. This greatly eased the vehicle management process for the school and improved parent satisfaction with punctuality maintained ever since. Lower maintenance cost. One of the most difﬁcult challenges faced by institutions is to provide in time a substitute for a broken down vehicle. Bus tracking applications enable predictive maintenance by providing insights on probable malfunctioning or notiﬁcation about due servicing. Thus, proactive service and maintenance minimises vehicle downtime. In case of a probable breakdown, vehicle owners can have a substitute bus ready to avoid any major service delay.

All in all... For institutions providing transport services, delivering safe, smooth, timely and efﬁcient services with minimal expenditure is crucial. All these factors culminate into trust and positive reputation of the institution in the eyes of its customers. And that’s what vehicle tracking applications are meant for! —Paromik Chakraborty, technical journalist, EFY

India achieved 1396MW of rooftop solar capacity as of March 2017, with Tamil Nadu being the leader, followed by Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Gujarat and then Karnataka.

Coming Soon: Pay-As-You-Go Wi-Fi

Artiﬁcial Intelligence On Hire! � Harness the power of artiﬁcial intelligence to transform your business operations and serve customers better.

A

lmost everyone agrees that artiﬁcial intelligence (AI) is the next big thing for businesses. But, is there any AI platform ready for you to deploy? While IBM’s Watson is the most widely known AI platform, there are many more for you to hire.

Amazon AI Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers a good range of AI services including tools, platforms, frameworks and infrastructure. Amazon Machine Learning is a cloud-based service that makes machine learning technology available to users of all skill levels. Using powerful algorithms, it helps users create machine learning models by ﬁnding patterns in existing data, and using these patterns to make predictions from new data as it becomes available. Offering a user-friendly interface utilising visualisation tools,

Responding to start-ups’ demand for setting up a country-wide network of Wi-Fi hotspots, TRAI is readying to launch a pilot where smallpack data will be made available to price-sensitive customers at highly competitive rates.

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SMART WORLD wizards and more, the highly scalable learning engine backed by AI APIs for speech recognition, advanced platform enables creation, evaluasearch, natural language processing, tion and deployment of meaningful video, image and text analysis, and machine learning (ML) models. AWS much more, gives users a machine also provides AI services like image recognition, text-to-speech, voice and learning model with beneﬁts like accurate real-time analytics, efﬁcient text chatbots, and more. anomaly detection and correction, This service is widely used in prediction, easy search and recomapplications like demand forecast, mendations, meaningful insight into user activity prediction, item recomcomplex unstructured data, automendation, fraud detection and susmated processes and so on. picious transaction ﬂagging, review Customers of any stature ranging ﬁltering and so on. Amazon Machine from search engines, online retail, Learning’s secret of ease lies in its job search sites, sales or marketautomated processing in every step. ing up to bioengineering or even Experts suggest that this plataerospace and defence ﬁrms will form is well-suited for users who ﬁnd Google Cloud ML platform are looking for quick and powerful yet low-cost solutions. It is also a recommendable platform for relatively newer users. It can be used for retail, food chain, hospitality, sports and entertainment, and ﬁnance among other sectors. Let’s look at the example of Upserve—a US-based company that delivers cloud-based intelligence and management system for restaurants. Amazon Machine Learning, ingesting data like IBM Watson (Image courtesy: wikimedia commons) reservations, real-time payment processing, menu preference histories, suitable for their requirement. The customer count and so on, developed biggest conﬁdence in using Google’s over a hundred machine learning offerings comes from the fact that models, which helped Upserve’s client the global giant itself uses the same restaurants to improve proﬁtability technologies in its own systems as and drastically cut down on wastage offered to its customers. based on major predictive parameters. In a real-life scenario, Google’s ML platform has beneﬁted the likes Google Cloud Machine of Airbus Defense and Space in Learning Engine detection and correction of satellite images. Even at high quality level, Google Cloud ML platform has made satellite images capture phenomena a mark very quickly despite being a like cloud formation, which hinder much newer release than Amazon the real motive of the picture like or Azure ML platforms. This plataccurate atmosphere or seasonal form attends to developers’ desire of analysis—something which is used forging their own machine learning in areas like precision farming, yield model—no matter how complex or prediction or crop health analysis, how large. This ability comes from where data is required to be absothe TensorFlow system—Google’s lutely precise. At Airbus, the process open source deep learning framehad been manual, time-consuming work—lying at the heart of Google’s and error-prone for over a decade. machine learning platform. Google’s solution automated it and The massively scalable machine 80

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delivered to Airbus customers results with absolute accuracy and detailed insight. Thus, Google’s platform is capable of delivering solutions for any scale of complexity.

IPSoft Amelia USA-based IPSoft created an intriguing AI innovation, called Amelia. The interesting aspect of Amelia is its interaction capabilities coupled with conversation and advanced learning talents that push it closer to the true sense of AI. Geared with advanced learning and self-learning tools, machine learning and deep learning capabilities, understanding of entire sentences and conversations with knowledge of 20 languages, and facial expression and emotion detection, the system can extract knowledge from large documents and historical records, interact directly with its employer’s customers, educate human colleagues, oversee and streamline workﬂow in a management role, and do much more. The applications of Amelia put a major focus towards digital workforce management. Chetan Dube, founder and CEO, IPSoft, says, “Amelia is neither a platform, nor a solution. It is a digital employee who has been designed with intelligence, reasoning and decision-making skills that help her more closely resemble the way humans think, act, and work. Amelia is a scalable digital workforce that can address as much work volume as needed. She has a direct impact on the key ROI metrics that shareholders and management teams prioritise above all others. Amelia’s ability to learn more quickly, manage more complex dialogues, respond to analytical triggers in real time, and better understand those with whom she interacts with truly sets her apart as a valuable asset for any modern enterprise.” AI has the capability to take up any data-driven work, some examples being data mining, analysis, prediction, real-time actions and process automation, enabling decision-makers to efﬁciently manage their workforce WWW.EFYMAG.COM

SMART WORLD by shifting repetitive or accuracymajor tasks to the platform. Currently, Amelia has been taken up by over 50 organisations globally in sectors as wide-ranging as ﬁnancial services, telecommunications, leisure, travel, healthcare, IT, BPO and government. It is substantially involved in the roles of customer service, ﬁnance and banking, insurance, IT infrastructure management, human resources, service desks, or even technical guide or advisor for ﬁeld-workers or engineers. Let’s take the case of an online gaming major which needed a sophisticated agent to connect with gamers for support and block phishing attempts or ever-evolving fraud techniques, for which the company needed to quickly adapt in order to maximise customer service and workﬂow efﬁciency. Amelia cannot be socially engineered—a feature the company leveraged to interact with human customers and verify accounts. Amelia is helping the gaming company to verify user identities at 100 per cent accuracy, cut fraud-screening time from ﬁve minutes down to three minutes and receive an 86.72 per cent customer satisfaction rating—higher than with human operators.

Microsoft Azure Microsoft’s machine learning platform was introduced for public preview in July 2014, and since then it has picked up good steam. The specialty of the Azure Machine Learning platform is the interactive user interface brought by the integrated Azure Machine Learning Studio, which allows users to set up their machine learning model through simple drag-and-drop actions. Inbuilt algorithm makes building supervised and unsupervised learning models easy. However, the modelling process requires active intervention of users in all development steps. Support for R and Python programming languages is a bonus for users who plan to create or customise their own ML models. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Additionally, Azure ML supports a wide range of statistical functions and methods which are core to Data Science. Supported ML models include regression, binary and multi-class classiﬁcation, clustering, recommendations and anomaly detection. All user categories ranging from SMEs up to large industries in different verticals including retail, insurance, ﬁnance and banking, healthcare, oil and gas or even manufacturing can beneﬁt from this AI platform. Smarter and swift predictive analytics, project outcome management, re-usable and scalable models, efﬁcient data pipelines, risk and fraud management, and patient recovery and treatment prediction are some of the biggest beneﬁts of Azure Machine Learning. The Microsoft Azure website showcases a story where Mendeley, a free research content reference and academic network platform for researchers, students and academic readers, implemented Azure Machine Learning to manage its users better, provide more accurate recommendations, and improve interface response and overall user experience. Feeding historical data like user activity trends, views, libraries, searches and data provided by the marketing team, helped the company to build ML models, which eventually improved the company’s recall by 30 per cent.

IBM Watson IBM Watson is an interactive cognitive platform whose analytical basis is the humongous amount of disparate big data structures that the system can engulf. It computes this data at very high speed and analyses to give the results in minimal time. Talking about its cognitive and interactive capability, Dr Prashant Pradhan, executive director, Watson & Cloud, and chief developer advocate, IBM India/South Asia, says, “Watson understands the nuances of human language, so it is able to

bring back relevant answers in context of the question. Watson also gets smarter, learning from each interaction with its users, and each piece of data it ingests.” Driven on the IBM Bluemix cloud platform, IBM Watson comes with 50 AI APIs including IBM dialogue, retrieve and rank, machine learning, speech-to-text, text-to-speech and, more interestingly, concept and visual Insight that enable an application to expand and relate concepts, drawing on the meaning of a word rather than simple text matching, and allow developers to build apps that reveal insights from social media images and video. As an analytics platform, Watson provides a visual representation of the business drivers and insights into any focus areas. While the major involvement of the user is in loading the correct data, rest of the background computations are mostly automated within the system. Watson has seen diverse uses in sectors like healthcare (to suggest treatments for cancer), ﬁnancial services (to recommend personalised portfolios using the latest information), customer engagement, law, retail, fashion and education. In an interesting application from India, Sriram Raghavan, director, India Research Labs, IBM India/South Asia, explains how Watson is being used in diverse industries like fashion as well. Designers at Falguni Shane Peacock took up IBM Watson to design their line called ‘Future of Bollywood Fashion.’ The system analysed data from 600,000 publicly available fashion runway images of the last decade, 5000 Bollywood celebrity images from social networks and 3000 historical Bollywood fashion images. With the help of visual recognition APIs and tools from the IBM Research Cognitive Fashion project, the system was able to assist signiﬁcantly in the design process. —Paromik Chakraborty, technical journalist, EFY If you want to share such case studies with EFY readers, please contact us at [email protected] ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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EDA TO NUMERICAL ANALYSIS Made Easy The following software, besides other, can be found in the DVD accompanying EFY Plus edition of this magazine DipTrace 3.1.0.1 Although there are many electronic design automation (EDA) software available, DipTrace stands out as an open source PCB tool. This software comprises schematic capture editor, PCB layout editor and export editor, component editor and pattern editor tools. The simple user interface, wide import/export capabilities, smart manual routing tools, real-time 3D PCB preview and ODB++/gerber export format make DipTrace designer-friendly. The upcoming version 3.1.0.1 has a major bug ﬁxing upgrade.

KiCad 4.0.6 KiCad EDA tool lets you design electronic circuit schematics and convert these into PCB designs too. Besides schematic capture and PCB layout, it can create bill of material, artwork, gerber ﬁles and 3D view of PCB and components. Bugs in the software have been ﬁxed in the updated version, 4.0.6. The new version also has ‘Avhttp’ library replaced with ‘libcurl’ library for GitHub plugin. Thus, KiCad can be distributed with GitHub plugin.

Kactus2_3.4.0 Kactus2 is a graphical EDA tool for designing embedded products, especially FPGA-based multiprocessor systems-on-chip. It can be

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used to create hardware designs with hierarchy, and integrate hardware with software. Thus, this tool is able to import existing module headers from Verilog and VHDL IPs.

Kali Linux 2017.1 Kali is a Linux distribution for professional testing and security audit. Its updated version, 2017.1, has several additional features and upgrades. As it has now an updated kernel, it can provide much better hardware support. For instance, RTL8812AU wireless chipset, which was not a part of the standard Linux kernel, can now be installed using a set of commands. Besides, Kali Linux can now use cloud GPUs for password cracking.

Komodo Edit 10.2.2 Komodo Edit is a simple polyglot editor that is becoming increasingly popular with features like debugging, collaboration, integration and unit testing. Above all, it is a multiplatform and multi-language editor available on Windows, Mac OS and Linux platforms. There are several other upgrades and features too that make Komodo a unique open source freeware for users.

WinMerge 2.14 WinMerge is an open source differencing and merging tool for Windows. It can compare both folders

and ﬁles, presenting differences in a visual text format that is easy to understand and handle. It has various features including ﬂexible syntax colouring editor, windows shell integration, visual source safe integration and Unicode support. It also supports ﬁlename and line ﬁltering, side-by-side line difference and difference highlighting inside lines. A ﬁle map shows the overall ﬁle differences too. Above all, WinMerge supports multiple languages, which can be translated into other languages.

Brave web Browser (X64) Brave is a new free and open source web browser that is based on Chromium browser and its blink engine. It is designed to block website trackers and remove the intrusive Internet advertisements. Thus, it claims to share less data with advertisers, and thus ensure online privacy. Brave also allows content creators and publishers on the web to earn from advertising revenues.

Mozilla Firefox 55.0 Mozilla Firefox is one of the most popular open source Internet browsers. It keeps on trending as its features usually upgrade frequently. In Mozilla 55.0, the websites will no longer ask the user’s location until these are encrypted. Chrome and Safari already have this option of being geolocation disabled.

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Zerynth 2.0.5: The IoT Platform

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he Internet of Things (IoT) gives users access to geographically distant places through smart applications running on it. Running these smart applications requires a platform to interface the software with embedded boards. Zerynth Studio is one such powerful integrated development environment (IDE) for embedded programming in Python that enables the IoT.

Go smart with Zerynth Zerynth can be used for most of the popular prototyping boards. New hardware boards have been released for Zerynth Studio. As per the application, the Python programming is done in the prototype. This information is sent to the cloud or a database, from where it is controlled and distributed. Once the ﬁrmware is designed, it is uploaded for mass programming to suit industrial application. Then, users can operate it smartly using the IoT technology. Zerynth IoT, initially known as Viper IoT, is now tailored for Zerynth 2.0.5. Imagine a user entering his home and without opening the refrigerator, he comes to know about the temperature and condition of food items inside the fridge. The user can also change the temperature of the fridge just through a Zerynth-powered application, called Refrigeration on Internet (ROI), running on his smartphone. Not only the refrigeration system but also smart lights and their colour can be controlled using an app on smartphones. Zerynth has also come up with the latest LoRa WAN among many more applications.

Updates The Zerynth stack includes tools as per applications, including Zerynth WWW.EFYMAG.COM

DESIGN & PROTOTYPING

NO ANDROID OR IOS CODING NEEDED

HYBRID C/PYTHON PROGRAMMING IS POSSIBLE

Select the supported hardware for prototyping

Code in Python, compile and upload

Connect to 3rd party clouds and control with Zerynth App PRODUCTION & DEPLOYMENT

NO BOOTLOADER REQUIRED FOOTPRINT: 60 OCK FLASH 3.5K RAM

Develop your own mobile app and enable OTA updates

�� for mass programming

Allow Zerynth VM Porting on Industrial MCUs

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virtual machine, Zerynth Studio, Zerynth advanced device manager and Zerynth app. Zerynth Studio is an IDE that runs on Windows, MAC as well as Linux. Using Zerynth Studio programs can be managed through Python 3 or Hybrid C/Python. The user can select the RTOS as per the application in Zerynth Studio. Zerynth Studio PRO, the professional version of Zerynth Studio, enables ﬁrmware over-the-air (FOTA) updates, so it becomes

easy to keep your solution updated with customer requirements. As updates are made, the rest of the ﬁrmware keeps running normally. So the ofﬂine time of the device is considerably reduced. The FOTA process can be performed manually by using the components of Zerynth Studio library. Zerynth 2.0.5 has a lot of functionalities like advanced device manager packed together in the form of an upgrade to match industry 4.0 applications. It also ELECTRONICS FOR YOU PLUS | AUGUST 2017

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DVD notiﬁcations and enhanced graphical user interface. New hardware supported by Zerynth 2.0.5 include WeMos D1 Mini, SparkFun RedBoard and Atmel SAM D21 xPlained PRO. While SparkFun Photon is a Wi-Fi enabled development platform, WeMos D1 Mini is a small Wi-Fi device for prototyping small smart objects linked to the web. On the other hand, xPlained D21 is an Atmel microcontroller-based device with some upgrades in the board for development of customised designs.

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supports many new devices. The device manager sandbox uses an application programming interface that adds high-level functions to interconnected devices. The subroutine call protocol is an upgrade in Zerynth advanced device manager that helps in taking service from a system without having the details

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of any remote system. The Zerynth advanced device manager can also be connected easily with the cloud monitoring the IoT services. Also, in version 2.0.5, the Zerynth App and its library have been clubbed with Zerynth advanced device manager. The refreshed Zerynth App includes push

Zerynth and smart world Zerynth IDE is easy to handle. It allows you to use any 32-bit microcontroller to design any embedded application for the IoT. It can connect to any cloud infrastructure. So, to create a system on cloud, there is no need to cut, copy, paste or drag from different sources now.

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Ease Your Numerical Analysis With OCTAVE 4.2.1

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o calculate the area of a circle, you can follow the simple formula of �r2 (where ‘r’ is the radius of the circle). But, calculating the mathematical value of ‘�’ beyond nine digits involves a technique called numerical analysis. When designing complex products such as aircrafts or rockets, Octave 4.2.1 can be a boon for designers. Octave is a special high-level software used for numerical computation. It is basically a solution provider to linear and non-linear numerical problems.

Scientiﬁc Octave and how it works Octave is a powerful scientiﬁc programming language that runs on GNU/Linux, MacOS, BSD and Windows. Users can solve all the linear/non-linear algebra and statistical analysis and other numerical experiments using Octave. On most systems, Octave runs with the shell command ‘octave,’ where it displays a graphical user interface. Octave can do elementary calculations, create a matrix, use integral differential equations, produce a graphical output, edit and document all the processes. Each of these calculations involves a set of programs. For example, to verify Euler’s identity, you need to follow the simple steps given below: ei×pi=–1 octave:1> exp (i×pi) Besides, Octave has a help facility where documents in printed form are also available in Octave prompt as creation ﬁles for both IV

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Fig. 1: Octave work plot (Image courtesy: http://ccm.net/download)

Fig. 2: Octave plotting snapshot (Image courtesy: http://blog.ctaggart.com) WWW.EFYMAG.COM

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are the same. With Octave, users can recall, edit and re-issue previous commands. They can specify the program to run, which Octave calls from its set of programs. And while Octave is running, until the terminal command is used, users can’t exit the program.

What is new in version 4.2.1 Basically, this version has been released for bug ﬁxing. But apart from all the similarities that it shares with MATLAB, version 4.2.1 is different in that it does not print outputs to the console until all the commands in queue are terminated. This function is controlled by a Boolean variable. Besides, there were several bugs in Octave’s previous version, which have been ﬁxed in 4.2.1. Plotting in Octave is done through OpenGL function, which is displayed as an invalid function while zooming in this software. This bug has been ﬁxed in the recent version. Earlier, plot code and source code were mismatched, so proper documentation was difﬁcult. Suppose if there was a manual to be compiled, the histogram for this purpose used to be different each time. This affected the documentation. The 4.2.1 version resolves this issue. There are some other small but time-saving changes that ﬁx the incorrect handling or mismanaged binary data fed in complex constants. Also, as soon as the user exits Octave, the editor saves the widget settings again. Users experienced desktop crash or instant logout when using Octave in Xubuntu 16.04. Version 4.2.1 resolves this issue, too. Besides, there are many other bugs related to commands, which have been ﬁxed.

Applications Apart from use on desktops for WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Fig. 3: Octave debugging (Image courtesy: www.gnu.org)

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personal scientiﬁc computing, Octave is also used by researchers and industries. In addition to numerical analysis, it is majorly used for signal processing using FFT techniques. Signal processing is a major application area in digital electronics, where it is an integral function of test and measurement instruments like spectrum analysers, oscilloscopes and frequency meters. Above all, digital signal processing and audio signal processing are also carried out using Octave software for proper

acquisition of images and audio samples. To simply the process, Octave considers its audio data as vectors of samples.

In nutshell Although Octave is compatible with MATLAB in many aspects and shares many similarities, there are ﬁelds where MATLAB dominates Octave, and vice-versa. But, above all, Octave is an open source software that ﬁnds many uses and is gaining popularity over a period of time with new released versions. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU PLUS | AUGUST 2017

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OpenAPC: The Process Control Software

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penAPC (short for ‘open automatic process control’) is an open source SCADA software that ﬁnds wide-ranging applications from automating readings and alarms for automation systems to laser engraving. It is a complete package for multi-platform visualisation, process control and human-machine interface (HMI) application.

Components The automation system consists of several sub-components that specialise in different tasks. From an electronics hardware-cum-software process to mechanical process, OpenAPC provides a wide range of services. Be it automation and control of production lines to CNC and material processing, or job-work of cutting, welding and engraving, this automation software is a boon to users. OpenAPC consists of ControlRoom, CNConstruct and BeamConstruct tools. ControlRoom is a process control software to create and run HMIs. Other than controlling machinery and production processes, it also caters to home automation. CNConstruct is a CAD application used for seamless process control of a project undertaken in WYSIWYG environment. BeamConstruct is similar to CNConstruct CAD application but serves laser-based operations like welding, cutting, engraving and surface cleaning.

Functions OpenAPC is a simple but comWWW.EFYMAG.COM

Fig. 1: CNConstruct (Image source: www.openapc.com)

Fig. 2: BeamConstruct (Image source: www.openapc.com)

prehensive software package that provides designers with a complete idea of automation systems including CAD-based operation. Thus, it saves their precious time. OpenAPC supports several lev-

els—from application development to execution. OpenEditor, a component of OpenAPC, allows designers to create applications as per their requirements. It also lets them modify existing projects. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU PLUS | AUGUST 2017

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Fig. 3: OpenAPC Debugger (Image source: www.openapc.com)

including CAD for process control, HMI, supervisory control, data acquisition and processing, home automation and professional automation. Version 4.7.1 has a lot more to offer. Settings for the project executed include general settings, privilege settings and user settings. General settings for HMI editor include features such as the size of the HMI editor, grid size, snap to grid, background colour, control ﬂow time-out and timer resolution. Selecting ‘User Privileges’ from ‘File’ menu allows users to make changes according to priorities in the HMI editor, while user settings let them edit, add or make changes, or even delete the existing program. Similarly, there are options for HMI control properties and types (including controls, displays, static elements and containers). OpenEditor has options for ﬂow symbols, creating and editing ﬂow containers, adding ﬂow objects and HMI objects, and editing ﬂow objects.

Advantages

Fig. 4: HMI Editor (Image source: www.openapc.com)

Next, to provide an interface between the user and plug-ins, the HMI is set through Flow Editor. The Flow Editor can be modiﬁed as per the plug-ins. And this option is called OpenPlugger. Users can later run the program using OpenPlugger option. Soon after modiﬁcations in the application developed, designers need to execute the program in VIII

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OpenDebugger in order to rectify errors in the program and check data ﬂow. The program can be ﬂipped between OpenEditor and OpenPlugger windows without affecting the application development or runtime.

Features of OpenAPC 4.7.1 As mentioned earlier, OpenAPC performs a host of applications

OpenAPC provides a ﬂexible network capability with an open plugin interface to add new controls and interfaces during application development. Designers have the liberty to use this software on any platform—Windows, XP, Linux, MacOS and more. Project creation in OpenAPC is easy due to visual editor, which provides designers with an option to switch between applications, make changes on the editor, interface and debug simultaneously. File transfer is simple with no operation costs involved. Above all, OpenAPC is a very simple software that can be used by designers without any special training. The ease of understanding the commands in this automation software, and no fancy features that overlap, make it a designerfriendly tool. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

�� NEWS MAKE IN INDIA

Global Hi-Fi system market to grow 5.2 per cent annually The global Hi-Fi system market will grow annually at 5.2 per cent to reach $12.463 billion by 2022, from $9.674 billion in 2017—according to WiseGuyReports market research ﬁrm. Growing digitisation of systems is one of the major drivers of global Hi-Fi systems market. Booming demand for portable smart devices such as smartphones, tablets and laptops is strengthening the demand for wireless audio products. Emerging smart home industry and demand for Hi-Fi

systems in automobiles will further bolster the global Hi-Fi system market growth during the forecast period. Residential application, which held the largest market share in 2016, will continue its dominance, while automotive application segment will witness the fastest growth. Geographically, APAC region, which accounted for the largest share of Hi-Fi system market in 2016, will retain its position till the end of the projected period.

AI to feature in almost every new software by 2020 Market hype and growing interest in artiﬁcial intelligence (AI) are pushing established software vendors to introduce AI into their product strategy, creating considerable confusion in the process, according to Gartner, Inc. Analysts predict that by 2020, AI technologies will be virtually pervasive in almost every new software product and service. In fact, AI will be a top ﬁve investment priority for more than 30 per cent of CIOs. Said Jim Hare, research vice president at Gartner, “AI offers exciting possibilities, but unfortunately, most vendors are focused on the goal of simply building and marketing an AI-based product rather than

ﬁrst identifying needs, potential uses and the business value to customers.” The huge increase in startups and established vendors, all claiming to offer AI products without any real differentiation, is confusing buyers. More than a thousand vendors with applications and platforms describe themselves as AI vendors, or say they employ AI in their products. Advancements in AI, such as deep learning, are creating a lot of buzz but obfuscating the value of more straightforward, proven approaches. Also, more than half the respondents to Gartner’s AI survey indicated the lack of necessary staff skills as the top challenge to adopting AI in their organisation.

India will lead the global mobile revolution The global mobile penetration will reach 70 per cent by 2022, buoyed by the rising adoption in the Asia-Paciﬁc region, especially India and China— WWW.EFYMAG.COM

according to the latest Forrester report. India’s mobile phone market will double in the coming ﬁve years, making the country lead the chart.

On The Move Sundararajan becomes full-time telecom secretary, Sawhney gets MeitY Aruna Sundararajan, secretary of IT and electronics, has taken full charge of the department of telecom (DoT), which till now was an additional charge given to her in May this year. Ajay Prakash Sawhney is now the new Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) secretary in place of Sundararajan.

Subramanian is now Tata Sons’ digital chief Tata Sons has appointed Aarthi Subramanian as the group’s chief �� was the executive director at Tata Consultancy Services, brings with her over 26 years of experience in the global technology sector. Starting her career with TCS, she has worked in diverse roles in India, Sweden, the US and Canada. As the group’s �� key role in driving digital adoption across group companies as well as the group’s digital initiatives.

Raja quits Philips India Philips India managing director V. Raja has resigned amidst a string of other senior-level exits. Expat Daniel Mazon from Latin America will now take charge of India operations. Mazon played a big part in turning around the Latin America business and was heading the healthcare business there. The company’s internal circular said that Raja, who had taken charge of the company in December 2015, is taking an early retirement on September 30 due to personal reasons. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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INDUSTRY NEWS Calendar of Forthcoming Electronics Fairs/Exhibitions/Seminars/Events Name, Date and Venue

Topics

Contact address for details

IFA 2017 September 1-6, 2017 Berlin, Germany

Meeting place for key retailers, buyers, and experts from the consumer electronics industry and the media

The German Association for Entertainment and Communications Electronics and Messe Berlin Website: http://b2b.ifa-berlin.com

National Seminar on Inverterization for Energy �� Applications and Opportunities September 6 or 7, 2017 New Delhi

Seminar highlighting the potential of energy saving in India by adoption of inverterisation in residential and commercial spaces, the need for policies, standards and regulatory framework �� reduction in the total cost of ownership, and sharing industry knowledge and fostering collaboration between government, technology developers and OEMs

Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.cii.in

World Robot Olympiad India �� September 9-10, 2017

Robotics competition in India for students between the age group of 9 to 25 years

India STEM Foundation, and National Council of Science and Museum. Website: https://indiastemfoundation. org/wroindia/

ELCINA-EFY Awards 2016-17 September 14, 2017 New Delhi

Awards for excellence in electronics hardware manufacturing and services

www.elcina.com

AI World 2017 September 18-20, 2017 Boston, USA

�� and expo

AI World 2017 Website: https://aiworld.com

�� October 2-4, 2017 Marina Bay Sands, Singapore

Festival of technology that brings together Asia’s telco and tech ecosystem to discover technologies that are enabling and shaping our connected future

TechXLR8 Asia Website: https://tmt.knect365.com/ techxlr8-asia/

Innovate! and Celebrate 2017 October 9-11, 2017 InterContinental San Francisco

3-day global conference celebrating innovation & entrepreneurship

Website: https://www.innovatecelebrate.com/

Taitronics Taipei October 11-14, 2017 Taipei, Taiwan

International trade fair for electronics and electronic components

Taiwan External Trade Development Council Website: http://www.taitra.org.tw/

Global Sources Consumer Electronics October 11-14, 2017 AsiaWorld-Expo, next to Hong Kong Airport

Showcase of consumer electronics, gaming and VR, components and smart living products

Website: www.globalsources.com

Open Source India October 13-14, 2017 NIMHANS Convention Center, Bengaluru, India

Asia’s annual convention to celebrate open source computing

Open Source India Website: http://opensourceindia.in/ osidays/

Hong Kong Electronics Fair (Autumn Edition) October 13-16, 2017 Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre

World’s leading electronics marketplace

Hong Kong Trade Development Council Website: www.hkelectronicsfairae.com

Global Sources Mobile Electronics October 18-21, 2017 AsiaWorld-Expo, next to Hong Kong Airport

Showcase of smartphones, tablets, wearables and accessories

22nd World Electronics Forum (WEF) 2017 October 24-28, 2017 Angers, France

Website: http://wef-angers.com/ Meeting place for electronics industry leaders and federations from all over the world to discuss hot topics in the electronics sector, alongside showcase of IoT expertise and innovation

�� Summit 2017 November 9-12, 2017 Bangalore International Exhibition Centre

World expo and conference on renewable energy

ASSOCHAM India

Big Data London November 15-16, 2017 Olympia, London, UK

The UK’S largest data and analytics event

Big Data London Website: http://bigdataldn.com/

CeBIT INDIA 2017 November 30-December 2, 2017 White Orchid Convention Centre, Hebbal, Bengaluru

Digital innovation show

Hannover Milano Fairs India Pvt Ltd Website: www.cebit-india.com

�� December 21-23, 2017 Shenzhen Convention & Exhibition Center, China

Annual expo for the electronics industry based in Shenzhen

ELEXCON 2017 Website: www.elexcon.com/elexcon/en

Website: www.globalsources.com

Continued on next page...

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AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Forrester expects the global mobile device user base to reach more than 5.5 billion by 2022, of which 3.8 billion will be smartphone users. Nearly 94 per cent of smartphone owners use Android or iOS. Android is expected to capture 73 per cent of the market share (with more than 1.8 billion users) in 2017, followed by Apple (21 per cent) and Windows (4 per cent).

India’s mobile production jumps ` 700 billion in three years In FY 2016-17, mobile phones worth ` 900 billion were produced in India, as against ` 189 billion during 2014-15 and ` 540 billion during 2015-16, according to telecom minister Manoj Sinha. At the same time, mobile imports fell from 210 million devices (worth about $7948 million) in 2014-15 to 146 million units ($6059 million) in 2015-16. The minister further said that all major domestic and foreign brands have either set up their manufacturing units already or are in the process of doing so. A number of ﬁrms have also sub-contracted manufacturing to electronics manufacturing services (EMS) companies.

IITs to get supercomputers for research As part of the government’s ‘Make in India’ initiative, supercomputers will be manufactured in India under a three-phase programme. In the initial two phases of the National Supercomputers Mission (NSM), the focus will be on designing and manufacturing subsystems such as high-speed Internet switches and compute nodes indigenously. The plan is to have six supercomputers in the ﬁrst phase, of which three supercomputers will be imported. System assemblies for the remaining three will be manufactured abroad, but assembled in India. C-DAC will be responsible for the overall system design. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

INDUSTRY NEWS Continued from previous page...

Calendar of Forthcoming Electronics Fairs/Exhibitions/Seminars/Events Name, Date and Venue

Topics

Contact address for details

�� January 9-12, 2018 Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

World’s gathering place for those who thrive on the business of consumer technologies and where next-generation innovations are introduced to the marketplace

Consumer Technology Association Website: www.ces.tech

NEPCON Japan January 17-19, 2018 Tokyo Big Sight, Japan

Asia’s leading exhibition for electronics design, R&D and manufacturing technology

Reed Exhibitions Japan Ltd Website: http://www.nepconjapan.jp/en/

Electronics West February 6-8, 2018 Anaheim Convention Center, California, USA

North America’s largest annual design and manufacturing event

Electronics West Website: http://electronicswest. designnews.com/

�� February 27-March 1, 2018 Exhibition Centre, Nuremberg, Germany

Trade fair for IT security for electronic systems

ELCERAMA March 10-14, 2018 India Expo Mart, Greater Noida, Uttar Pradesh

Flagship showcase of the Indian electrical industry ecosystem and the largest congregation of power sector ecosystem in the geography; brings together the complete spectrum of solutions that powers the planet

NürnbergMesse Website: www.embedded-world.de/en

IEEMA Website: http://elecrama.com, http://ieema.org

Since this information is subject to change, all those interested are advised to ascertain the details from the organisers before making any commitment.

These six supercomputers will be placed at four IITs (Banaras Hindu University, Kanpur, Kharagpur and Hyderabad), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune, and Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. The NSM envisages nearly 50 supercomputers in three phases. The government plans to make these high-precision computing machines available for scientiﬁc researches across the country.

Reliance Unlimit and China’s Fibocom to jointly develop IoT solutions Reliance Communications’ Unlimit has partnered with Chinese telecom gear maker Fibocom to design and manufacture modules for wireless communications and develop Internet of Things (IoT) solutions. “The number of connected devices in India is projected to rise from 200 million today to three billion by 2020, and nearly every part of the economy will be positively impacted by IoT,” said Unlimit chief executive ofﬁcer Juergen Hase. “We are delighted to partner with Fibocom to unlock the full potential 86

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

of the Internet of Things for our customers,” he added. Unlimit is an independent company of Reliance Group that focuses solely on providing IoT solutions to enterprises.

Foxconn eyes exports from India to Gulf, Africa by Dec Taiwan-based electronics contract manufacturer Foxconn plans to start exporting to the Middle East and African countries from India by year-end. It has already initiated talks with suppliers to set up base in India—the fastest growing smartphone market in the world. The electronics maker has stepped up expansion of its manufacturing facility in Sri City, Andhra Pradesh, and is looking to add more locations. If everything goes as planned, Foxconn would be much ahead of Samsung’s target of exporting from India by 2020.

Intex to co-develop Reliance Jio 4G phone Reliance Jio has chosen Intex as a vendor for its 4G feature phone, which will debut in August and help Reliance Jio get users that

couldn’t switch to its 4G network as their 2G/3G phones didn’t support 4G VoLTE. “The phone, which Intex is making in India, will be priced by Jio through a subsidy model, and will also be marketed by the new telco, with the handset maker not involved in both aspects,” said Nidhi Markanday, director and business head, Intex Technologies.

Canon to expand retail presence Canon India plans to increase the number of Canon Image Square (retail stores) in India from 232 to 260 by year-end. “The expansion would not only take place in metros but also in tier II and III cities. Naturally, the size of the stores tend to get smaller in smaller towns than in metros but the function will be the same,” said Kazutada Kobayashi, president and CEO, Canon India.

INNOPAT, 2nd Edition concludes successfully in Bengaluru India Electronics and Semiconductor Association (IESA), the premier trade body representing the Indian electronics system design and manufacturing (ESDM) industry, and IPexcel, a technology research and consulting ﬁrm founded by IIT Kharagpur alumni, recently hosted INNOPAT— a social initiative to promote and showcase innovative proprietary (patented) technologies in India. In its second edition, the focus was on addressing the practical issues in patents experienced by innovators. The day-long conference had interesting sessions such as doit-yourself patent ﬁling workshop, outlook of investors on patent-driven start-ups, most innovative idea contest, case studies of successful start-ups, IP strategy for growing businesses, and a live consultation desk to evaluate the patentability of ideas. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

MAKE IN INDIA Market Survey

Lighting The LED WAY

T Sudeshna Das is director at ComConnect

he lighting market in India is evolving rapidly, moving from conventional products to LEDs. This transition is driven by the government’s emphasis on energy conservation, rising consumer awareness about energy-efﬁcient products, and innovative products offered by the industry that are in sync with the overall trend of digitisation. The market evolution is backed by a tectonic shift in technology from electrical to electronics. This, in turn, represents a signiﬁcant growth opportunity for companies offering electronic hardware/components and solutions used in LED lighting. The shift to LED lighting will also beneﬁt prototype designers, electronics manufacturing services providers and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). This report provides an insight into India’s LED lighting ecosystem, focusing primarily on market size, opportunities, major demand generating applications, hindrances that impact growth, emerging technology trends and the impact of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Market at a glance Being the second most populous country in the world and ﬁfth major 80 electricity consumer, 75% 75% India has been experi70 62.5% 62.5% encing an ever-widening 60 demand-supply gap in 50 electricity. Consequently, 40 37.5% the market for energy30 efﬁcient products such as LED lights is bound 20 12.5% 12.5% to grow. All the survey 10 participants felt that 0 the moderately-growing Street lighting – 75% lighting industry will Residential lighting – 75% Office space lighting – 62.5 % now move at a faster Industrial lighting – 62.5 % pace, as the government Retail lighting – 37.5% Automotive lighting – 12.5% is encouraging the use of Lighting for hospitality sector – 12.5% LED lights in a big way. Other growth drivers are Fig. 1: Major demand generating applications; �� the Smart Cities pro�� ject, and the increasing �� 88

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Methodology Inputs from eight senior industry exper ts and members across India’s LED lighting ecosystem were taken for this report. The ecosystem includes: 1. Large-scale LED lighting companies/OEMs 2. SME LED lighting companies/OEMs 3. Electronic component manufacturers 4. Industry associations

demand for a smart, connected lifestyle and energy-efﬁciency measures. According to a report by TechSci (a global research based consulting ﬁrm), the LED lighting market in India will grow annually at over 30 per cent during 2016-21. The Electric Lamp and Component Manufacturers Association of India (ELCOMA) estimates the LED market in India to grow to ` 216 billion by 2020. This leap will result in the LED market accounting for about 60 per cent of India’s total lighting industry (approximately ` 376 billion) in 2020. The key factors that are expected to boost the market include falling LED prices coupled with government schemes for LED light subsidies and LED street lighting. Moreover, rising consumer awareness about the cost-effectiveness, enhanced life, better efﬁciency and inherent eco-friendly nature of LED lights will continue to drive volume sales from industrial, residential and commercial sectors.

Opportunities abound LEDs are versatile products that can be used for residential lighting, street lighting, downlights, landscaping, monument lighting, signage, trafﬁc signals, security lights, industrial lighting, ofﬁce space lighting, automotive lighting and much more. Low energy consumption, low costs, modular designs and ease of use have made LED lighting the ﬁrst choice in industrial, commercial and domestic applications. According to survey participants, the top four demand-generating application areas for LED lights (Fig. 1) are street lighting, WWW.EFYMAG.COM

MAKE IN INDIA Government facilitating wide-scale implementation According to a Press Information Bureau (PIB) announcement, by 2019, 770 million LED bulbs and 35 million LED street lights will be deployed to replace conventional lights. Under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY), 27.3 million LED bulbs will be distributed to below-poverty-line (BPL) households. Under SLNP, over two million conventional street lights have already been replaced with LED street lights across the country.

TOP FIVE STATES THAT HAVE REPLACED CONVENTIONAL STREET LIGHTS WITH LED LIGHTS State

Number of street lights

Energy saved annually (kWh)

Rajasthan

704,891

99,054,808

Andhra Pradesh

586,037

82,352,849

Delhi

264,185

37,124,579

Gujarat

200,536

28,180,321

Goa

94,856

13,329,639

(Source: Press Information Bureau)

LED street light installation has resulted in energy savings of 295 million kWh, avoided capacity usage of over 73MW and cut carbon emissions by 230,000 million tonnes annually. The project has been implemented across 23 states and union territories.

residential lighting, ofﬁce space lighting and industrial lighting. The demand for street lights is driven by government initiatives, while in residential and ofﬁce spaces, demand is mainly driven by increasing consumer awareness about energy-efﬁcient products with more functionalities. In industrial areas, LEDs are used in warehouses, manufacturing ﬂoors, etc. In hazardous work areas across industries too, most of the new lighting is LED based. The demand for LED lighting in India still mostly comes from metro cities, mainly because of better consumer awareness and higher socio-economic growth. However, the demand from Tier-II cities is also expected to grow based on requirements from street lighting and industrial lighting domains. Currently, though, LED lights are not used much in rural India. Energy Efﬁciency Services Limited (EESL), a public-sector energy services company under the Ministry of Power, government of India, will implement the ﬁrst rural LED street lighting project by retroﬁtting one million conventional street lights with LED lights in the gram panchayats of seven districts of Andhra Pradesh under the Street Lighting National Project (SLNP). Further expansion of such initiatives across the country will WWW.EFYMAG.COM

ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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MAKE IN INDIA open up new markets for the LED lighting industry. According to 57 per cent of the survey participants, retroﬁt installations are the most in demand among all installation types (Fig. 2).

GST: Boon or bane? According to survey participants, the possible impact of GST on the LED lighting industry is not yet clear. However, their opinions are summarised below. Pros 1. A uniﬁed tax structure may help to create a uniﬁed market across the country 2. A uniﬁed tax structure may encourage big industries to support the formation of manufacturing clusters to avoid logistics costs, which were earlier nulliﬁed by differences in taxes across the country 3. Non-tax payers, which account for 30-35 per cent of the LED industry, have been enjoying an unethical price advantage compared to the big brands. GST implementation will compel non tax-compliant players to adhere to the tax system. This will have a long-term positive impact on the market and also give genuine brands a fair advantage 4. Less paperwork and borderless transits may bring down costs and delivery timelines, creating beneﬁts across the value chain. 5. GST will improve the efﬁciency of the supply chain across industries, including the LED lighting sector Cons 1. The GST rate on LED lights or ﬁxtures, including LED lamps, is 12 per cent, whereas components and raw materials used for manufacturing LED lamps attract GST rates ranging from 18 to 28 per cent. This anomaly may result in huge revenue leakage, and might even lead to unethical accounting practices like under-invoicing 2. Metal-core printed circuit boards (MCPCB) and LED ﬁxtures 90

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

57.1% New Installations Retrofit Installations 42.9%

��

will be roughly charged 12 per cent GST. This may discourage local assembly, resulting in increased ﬁxture imports 3. Some of the imported raw materials, which have been sourced from countries under category C of the Foreign Trade Policy 2015-20, were earlier attracting tax at two per cent, but after GST implementation, these will come under the 28 per cent tax slab. This will make local manufacture of products that use these materials unviable. Similarly, most electronic components fall under the 18 per cent category, up from six per cent earlier. 4. Most SMEs avail services of unregistered dealers. Earlier, such services were not taxable as the turnover of unregistered dealers tended to be very low. After GST implementation, companies are bound to pay 18 per cent tax (as reverse GST) even in the case of services offered by non-GST registered vendors

Emerging technology trends LED lighting not only lowers energy consumption levels but also enhances the overall lighting experience with respect to control, monitoring/sensing and connectivity, coupled with the convenience of long life and improved aesthetics. Survey participants shared insights on technology trends that will shape the LED lighting mar-

ket in India. Here is a collation of their views. Smart connected LED lights to be the next big thing. Lighting systems will get smarter, as the possibility of autonomous, self-commissioning illumination systems is emerging. The industry has transformed from analogue to digital as LED lighting allows users to control, monitor and measure lighting output. This transformation is taking place across public, home and professional lighting, and smart connected LED lights will emerge as the largest Internet of Things (IoT) device segment within the next ﬁve to ten years. Control devices, dimmers and wireless lighting with advanced sensors will cater to the needs of modern consumers. Driverless low-voltage directcurrent (LVDC) operated products. LVDC products enable energy saving by reducing AC-DC current conversion losses. This also makes the products compatible with solar photovoltaic systems, helping them to run as LED-solar hybrid systems, which will be quite effective in India, especially in rural areas. Advanced manufacturing practices. Shift in manufacturing techniques from through-hole to surfacemount technology (SMT) will enhance efﬁciency and automation while reducing operational costs. This, in turn, will help achieve break-even point quickly, in spite of a relatively higher capex cost. Evolved on-board technology. On-board technology will evolve through the use of IC-based drivers to support touch-based technology, which is the need of the hour for smart lighting systems. This will also reduce the number of components used in drivers. Use of fewer components will reduce costs while enhancing the efﬁciency of the ﬁnal product. Introduction of chip-scale packaging. Chip-scale packaging (CSP) WWW.EFYMAG.COM

MAKE IN INDIA or ﬂip-chip packaging technology enhances lumens output as well as product reliability. CSP eliminates the traditional sub-mount by attaching the LED die directly to the PCB, allowing overall system cost reductions.

Moving forward According to survey participants, the following challenges could derail growth of the LED lighting industry in India: 1. Sub-standard products from unauthorised manufacturing units and low-cost, poor-quality Chinese imports shaking consumer conﬁdence 2. Lack of consumer awareness about the LED efﬁciency with respect to lux, wattage, life expectancy, etc. As a result, consumers end up buying products with higher wattage but lower efﬁciency 3. The inability to make LED

WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Major contributors to this report � � � � � � � �

Anirudh Kajaria, business head, Century LED Avinash Goel, head-technical, development and sourcing, Opple Lighting India D. Christopher, GM, ELCOMA Devashish Ganguli, DGM, Havells Lighting Parimal Rajkunwar, director, Macon Power V. Sudarshan, MD, Spectrum Techvision Vijay Kumar Gupta, MD, Kwality Photonics V.P. Mahendru, chairman and MD, Eon Electric Ltd

chips and micro-chips resulting in their import at high cost. This also limits the development of a wider variety of LED light ﬁxtures, reducing the number of colours used, apart from hampering performance and crippling innovations in LED lighting 4. Absence of a sufﬁcient number of LED packaging units resulting in a high dependence on imports 5. Use of inefﬁcient drivers resulting in higher energy usage as well as product failure

6. Acute shortage of LED chip manufacturing experts from ﬁelds such as chemical, electronics, optics, lighting and thermal management Successfully resolving the aforementioned issues through appropriate industry initiatives and government interventions will help the LED lighting industry achieve sustainable growth, thus enabling the country to move towards greater self-sufﬁciency in power generation. This will make more power available to the public.

ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

91

TEST & MEASUREMENT

AUTOMATIC TEST EQUIPMENT Becoming Modular

W Vertica Asthana is a technical journalist at EFY

92

idely adopted in highly demanding engineering sectors, automated test equipment (ATE) are now silently making inroads in less capital-intensive sectors like lighting, too. Lighting majors are starting to realise the cost and labour beneﬁts of using ATE in PCB testing. Manufacturers in defence, avionics, automotive, telecom and robotics industries, on the other hand, use modular ATEs to adhere to the protocols of testing. As the technology evolves, they are asking for more and more features and application updates. The biggest challenge before test and measurement equipment manufacturers, though, remains the growing demand for tools that can cut down the test time for test engineers. To keep up with demand, ATE manufacturers have graduated to an advanced version of the existing PXI platform. Named PXI Express (PXIe), it increases testing speed and bandwidth while eliminating unnecessary costs. “Use of PXI Express has increased the speed and throughput of our test equipment by 50 per cent on an average,” says Sadaf Arif Siddiqui, business development manager at

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Keysight Technologies, in support of PXIe. Let us see how PXIe platform is charting the success for ATE in diverse applications.

RF test equipment RF device manufacturers need equipment that can quicken the process of testing their devices for performance, accuracy and traceability of the components. Major players in ATE market such as National Instruments (NI), Rohde and Schwarz, Keysight Technologies and Chroma ATE Inc. have responded to this demand by upgrading their RF test instruments to PXI technology. They are now working towards increasing the bandwidth while reducing the footprint. NI has developed its second-generation vector signal transceiver (VST) in PXI platform. Talking about it, Avichal Kulshreshtha, technical marketing staff member at NI, says, “Second-generation VST is a compact hardware with ﬁeld-programmable gate array (FPGA) IC. This IC is embedded with transceiver functions, which are run by the company’s LabVIEW software. Test measurement algorithms, bus speeds and CPU speeds have reduced test times, but as RF functions get more complex, improvements are being done.” NI claims that its recently released second-generation VST has ﬁve times the bandwidth, 33 per cent smaller footprint and larger user-programmable FPGA than its predecessor. Its instantaneous bandwidth of 1 GHz enables test systems for advanced applications like automotive radars, digital pre-distortion, 5G and 802.11ax. Similarly, Keysight has developed Keysight Measurement Framework (KMF) for its RF test equipment. The new platform increases the test efﬁciency while lowering the test time. “KMF is an easy-to-use software framework for rapid test solution development WWW.EFYMAG.COM

TEST & MEASUREMENT using Microsoft’s Visual Studio .NET environment. KMF (in PXI platform) helps to develop high-performance, scalable test measurement solutions, which take full advantage of parallel-processing multi-core CPUs for faster measurement processing and testing speed,” shares Keshav Bapat, general manager at Keysight Technologies.

Arbitrary waveform generators There is a demand for more costefﬁcient waveform generators, too. Manufacturers want signal generators that can replace expensive and complex systems that are customised to test only a single device. Test equipment manufacturers have come up with arbitrary waveform generators (AWGs) that cater to this need. AWG-based signal generation can also simplify emulation of various operational scenarios during the development of radar systems, electronic warfare systems, satellite communications systems and more. Both Keysight Technologies and NI have developed AWGs that offer increased bandwidth, resolution and number of channels. Tektronix, on the other hand, claims that its recently developed AWG offers a substantial increase in signal consistency and strength, and a sample rate of 10GSa/s, simplifying the job of signal generation and RF engineers. The device is expected to hit the market soon.

Oscilloscopes Testing challenges continue to grow as engineers develop systems with higher data rates. As speeds go up and amplitudes down, system noise becomes a major problem because it blocks important signal details. Therefore oscilloscopes are being reﬁned for improved signal ﬁdelity and channel scalability while occupying smaller footprint. NI has already introduced in the market oscilloscopes based on PXI 94

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

platform that offer up to 400MHz of analogue bandwidth and ﬂexible measurement conﬁgurations. Tektronix is also gearing up to launch a high-frequency oscilloscope.

Other advances These are just a few major advances made in semiconductor, signal system and transceiver based test equipment that are primarily used by defence, robotics, communication and automotive industries. According to market players, the ATE industry will continue to evolve as the requirements of test engineers grow. Industry expert Leela Krishna, from Rohde & Schwarz, shares that sometimes the test equipment is customised to suit the particular needs of a business. “Usually, our customers from the defence sector demand high-frequency test equipment. In such a case, we tweak the software of the instrument or else try to manufacture a new hardware for the instrument.” For instance, “Traditionally, ATEs had customised pin electronic cards that were made for speciﬁc test criteria. These have now been replaced with PXI platform slots, which can be used as per the scope of work,” informs Nitin Nigam, ﬁeld application engineer at Tektronix.

To sum up Design for manufacturability is the ﬁrst phase of a perfect design, leading to the next phase of advancements in measuring instruments. Modular ATE is a radical transformation of the testing process in sync with the product design trends. Combining PXI platform with a modular hardware architecture allows engineers to develop scalable test systems that can meet the needs of different business segments while lowering the cost and size of test systems. So we can say it is all about a revolution leading to evolution! WWW.EFYMAG.COM

INTERVIEW Internet of Things

“The Best OPPORTUNITIES Are At The INTERSECTION OF INDUSTRIES” SHEKHAR SANYAL

DIRECTOR AND COUNTRY HEAD, IET INDIA

Internet of Things (IoT) solutions are evolving day-by-day and opening up new gateways for progress and innovation. In a conversation with Paromik Chakraborty of Electronics For You, Shekhar Sanyal, director and country Head, IET India, talks about the business opportunities for startups in IoT space, impact of IoT on industries and endeavours of the IoT Congress

Q. What are the business opportunities for startups in the IoT? A. Right now, the best business opportunities in the IoT lie at the intersection of industries where no solution has been thought of yet. And by that, we mean intersection of data produced by industries. There lies a big opening for a startup if it can ﬁnd the intersection where the data of one industry can be used for another using IoT solutions. Most startups work on intersections where solutions are already available. The value comes from aligning the different datasets available and intersecting them so that the combination can beneﬁt the users in new ways.

Q. What are the areas for investments in industrial IoT? A. In sectors like automobile manufacturing, especially with the advent of electric cars, use of automation will keep increasing for the next three to ﬁve years. In the SME sector, the difference between the cost of investing in automated process and the cost of laboured process will start to narrow. So more and more SMEs will start implementing automation. Speaking of speciﬁc technology, AI will play a key role. Nanotechnology will also get linked to IoT and play a bigger role. New technologies will develop in the background, and that is where the investment should be made.

Q. How can Indian IoT startups hit the bull’s eye? WWW.EFYMAG.COM

A. Most startups are digitally savvy. They understand how the software and the technologies work. But, they lag behind in ﬁnding the link to the traditional industry. How many startups are looking at the electronics, electrical, power and energy, or automobile manufacturing industries, and providing solutions for them? These are the key infrastructure industries that are vital for the progress of the industrial economy. Since these industries are large and capital-intensive, startups tend to stay away from them.

Q. Please explain... A. Let’s consider the energy industry, where a primary area for deep-diving is the smart grid—it will essentially change the way power is distributed. Another example is e-transportation, where electric vehicles need to optimise their electricity consumption. The internal combustion engine, which has a lot of moving parts today, will become much more digital. This leads to many new things that can be done over and above what is already present on the ground. The third example is energy storage. The renewable energy sector needs highly efﬁcient solutions for storing and managing energy.

Q. How reliable are IoT networks currently? A. Security and privacy are separate concerns. A lot of work is being done to ensure security on the cloud, and the available security levels are quite

adequate. The challenge comes around privacy. There is presently no legal regulation or system for privacy handling. The situation is the same at global scale, and we all need to work towards bringing in some laws for data privacy.

Q. How will standardisation impact the industry? A. Currently, there are about 15 different standards in various parts of the IoT, especially surrounding the way the data stack comes in and the kind of systems used to transfer the data. Availability of so many different standards creates a silos within the platform, disrupting interoperability—the main idea of the IoT. Having a single standard opens up the silos and makes the platform stronger and more valid. From developers’ point of view, if there is a single common standard, you can just add onto the platform irrespective of what you create. It assimilates together and the value goes up. With standardisation, anything developed around the globe will work in your country as well and you will not have to worry about compatibility.

Q. What is the main agenda for this year’s IoT Congress? A. The theme of this year’s IoT Congress is healthcare, manufacturing and what’s next in IoT, with special attention to Clean Ganga project. It will focus on startups in IoT and also provide a peek into the virtual reality future of the IoT. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

95

NEW �� MAKE IN INDIA

TEST & MEASUREMENT

Signal quality analyser

In-building testing solution

Anritsu has introduced a versatile signal quality analyser, MP1900A BERT, that can measure next-generation PCI Express Gen 4 and Gen 5 buses, as well as the latest 400GbE/200GbE Ethernet networks. With comprehensive interface support, the MP1900A is

For in-building testing requirements, Transcom has introduced a new testing solution that takes only ﬁve seconds to ﬁnish operator frequency

when the range switches in V, � or Hz function. The meter has 14 functions and 33 ranges. It can measure AC/DC voltage, AC/DC current, resistance, capacitance, frequency and temperature, and perform transistor hFE and diode testing. It also has a data hold function. Kusam-Meco www.kusamelectrical.com

Baseband vector signal transceiver power measurement and data collection within the range of 7002700MHz and automatically outputs the result report. With IB-TX sweep signal source and IB-RX sweep signal receiver, all frequency point testing results can be automatically output in one test. The testing solution has a wide power testing range of -120dBm to +20dBm.

National Instruments has introduced baseband model of its second-generation vector signal transceiver. The new transceiver has 12 times the bandwidth, a 50 per cent smaller footprint

Anritsu India www.anritsu.com

Transcom Instruments www.transcomwireless.com

Digital multimeter Kusam-Meco has introduced a 3½-digit, 1999-count digital multimeter with terminal blocking system. The multimeter, Model KM6030, has a large (28mm) LCD. To avoid improper connection operation, the current terminal sockets are blocked by a mechanical protection device 96

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

an all-in-one solution that accurately measures next-generation high-speed electronic and optical devices, and optical transceivers used in high-end servers, communications equipment and optical transceivers/modules, including those for M2M and IoT applications. It supports simultaneous multi-channel measurements, PAM4 BER tests and PCI Express link negotiation.

Insulation tester/true RMS multimeter and a larger user-programmable FPGA. The PXIe-5820 module has 1GHz of complex I/Q bandwidth and is designed to address the most challenging RF front-end module and transceiver test applications, such as envelope tracking, digital pre-distortion and 5G test. It combines a wideband I/Q digitiser, wideband I/Q arbitrary waveform generator and high-performance user-programmable FPGA into a single two-slot PXI Express module. National Instruments www.ni.com/vst/

FLIR Systems’ MG320 portable 20G�/1000V insulation tester combines a true RMS multimeter. It includes PI/DAR modes, programmable timer and a comparator for custom test conﬁgurations and quick results. Multimeter functions include AC/DC voltage and resistance measWWW.EFYMAG.COM

NEW PRODUCTS urement, and continuity test. The device can manually store/recall up to 99 readings. It has a large backlit 6000-count LCD display with analogue bargraph, and meets CAT IV-600V safety standard.

sent infrastructure of the site. It lets users operate any AC appliance like fans, lights and coolers from any corner of their house effortlessly. The device is easy to install and consume less than 0.6mW per hour of operation.

FLIR Systems India www.extech.com

ARTech www.artechlabs.in

COMPONENTS

SMD crystals

USB Type-C port-controller ICs STMicroelectronics has introduced two new USB Type-C-certiﬁed portcontroller ICs with built-in protection, which help designers implement interfaces cost-effectively to support their required blend of USB features. These can include power negotiation, managed active cables and support for guest protocols.

The new controller ICs simplify choices for designers, with one device dedicated to controlling downstreamfacing ports, while the other can handle either downstream-facing, upstream-facing or dual-role use. Both ICs support Type-C cable-attachment and connector-orientation detection and can operate over a wide supply range of 3V to 22V with no external voltage regulator. STMicroelectronics www.st.com

Wifi eSwitch The Wiﬁ eSwitch from ARTech is an Internet of Things (IoT)tested product. It serves as a low-cost home automation product without making any changes in preWWW.EFYMAG.COM

Rajguru Electronics has introduced RoHS-compliant SMD crystals from CREC. Typical features of these crystals include 2.5x2.0x0.45mm3 ultra-thin ceramic package, 8mm wide tape and reel package for automatic assembly, and tight tolerance of 10ppm. These ﬁnd use in Bluetooth, mobile phones, wireless LAN, ofﬁce automation, and audio-video. Rajguru Electronics www.rajguruelectronics.com

Thyristors Littelfuse, Inc. has introduced a series of 40A standard high-temperature silicon-controlled rectiﬁer (SCR) thyristors that are ideal for use as switches for rectiﬁer and phase control applications such as voltage regulator, heating and motor speed controls. The new SJxx40x series thyristors can handle 600V, 40Arms and junction temperatures up to 150°C. These are designed to prevent the overheating and thermal runaway problems SCRs experience due to an application’s limited cooling capability or occasional overload situation. Also, these trigger with just a few milliamperes of current at less than 1.5V potential. Typical applications are in a variety of end uses including AC solidstate switches, indus-

trial power tools, exercise equipment, white goods and commercial appliances. Littelfuse, Inc. www.Littelfuse.com

RF Wi-Fi module Amp’ed RF Wireless Technology, a provider of advanced IoT wireless modules, has announced the availability of its WF61 module, which is designed for wireless streaming of video supporting up to HD 4k imaging. The WF61 supports both 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi bands, bringing together the speed and throughput of dual-band Wi-Fi, and enabling clear high-resolution video. The 5GHz band can handle the greater bandwidth needed for HD 4k imaging. Amp’ed RF provides the Linux kernel to ensure fast development of WF61 applications. Amp’ed RF Wireless Technology www.Ampedrftech.com

DC-DC converter modules Artesyn Embedded Technologies has announced three new series of 50V DCDC converter modules. These modules support the rapidly growing number of

high-power wireless base station and remote radio head deployments using GaN and high-voltage LDMOS technology for increased power density and higher efﬁciency. The AVE450 series offers greater than 95 per cent typical efﬁciency and up to 10-amp output current. The ADH700 and AVE500 series offer greater than 94.8 per cent typical efﬁciency and up to 14-amp output current. Artesyn Embedded Technologies www.artesyn.com ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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NEW PRODUCTS Field device connectors Phoenix Contact has introduced PLUSCON IP20+ connectors for signal, data and power applications in industries, which demand connections to be water- and dust-proof. The series

covers up to 65-pin signal connector, up to 150A power connector and data connectors for all bus systems like Ethernet, PROFINET, INTERBUS, PROFIBUS, DeviceNet and CANopen. Phoenix Contact India www.phoenixcontact.com

capable of simultaneously driving two AC induction motors. Each motor can draw up to 60A at up to 60V, or 3.6kW per channel. The FIM2360 supports multiple advanced operating modes, including scalar open-loop volts per Hertz, ﬁxed slip control or ﬁeld-oriented control torque/speed modes. It is suited for use in automatic guided vehicles, warehouse automation robots, police/military robots, personnel carriers, golf cars, materials handling equipment, electric boats, automated guided vehicles, agricultural robots or any other high-power, battery-operated applications.

TOOLS & EQUIPMENT

Roboteq www.roboteq.com

Unified communication servers

MISCELLANEOUS

Matrix has launched a range of uniﬁed communication servers for large and mid-level enterprises, mid-market companies, small and medium businesses, and government organisations. Named ‘SARVAM,’ the range consists of hardware platforms and

software server. With IP at core, uniﬁed communication servers offer connectivity for up to 3000 users. Three different variants are available: Eternity Lenx, Eternity Menx and Eternity Genx targeting large, medium and growing enterprises, respectively. The platforms support VoIP, GSM/3G, and traditional networks such as ISDN and PSTN.

Intelligent network interface controller The newest MOST150 intelligent network interface controller (INIC) from Microchip Technology enables automotive manufacturers and tierone suppliers to incorporate Media Oriented Systems Transport (MOST) networks in a daisy-chain conﬁguration on coaxial physical layer with the support of full-duplex communication, in addition to a ring topology. With a full-duplex daisy-chained network, a single cable segment is sufﬁcient to connect two adjacent devices in the

Matrix ComSec www.matrixcomsec.com

AC induction motor controller Roboteq, Inc has introduced a dualchannel variable-frequency drive 98

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

network, reducing cables and connectors for the back channel on each network connection. It also eliminates the return wire connecting the last

node of the network to the ﬁrst. This reduces wiring and component count. Microchip Technology www.microchip.com

New MCU software Texas Instruments (TI) has introduced DesignDRIVE Fast Current Loop software that makes C2000 microcontrollers push current-loop performance to less than one microsecond. Together, TI’s C2000 MCU portfolio and DesignDRIVE software deliver system-on-chip functionality, which simpliﬁes drive control system development. The software simpliﬁes designs by eliminating the ﬁeld-programmable gate array (FPGA) typically used for external current-loop control. Fast Current Loop software is a free update available for C2000 controlSUITE software. Texas Instruments www.ti.com/C2000Drives-pr

Transmitter/receiver evaluation boards ROHM has announced USB Power Delivery (USBPD) compatible transmitter/ receiver evaluation boards that connect to information and peripheral devices using the new ‘Type-C connector.’ USBPD extends the power supply range from the conventional 15W to up to 100W (20V/5A) between USB Type-C compliant devices. This enables larger devices such as laptops and TVs to be powered via USB. The new BM92AxxMWV-EVK-01 series integrates ROHM’s USBPD controller IC that supports the USB Type-C Rev1.1 and USBPD Rev2.0 standards for connecting with USB Type-C devices. The initial launch consists of six boards in a mix of both receiver and transmitter types to meet the needs of a variety of applications. Users can combine receiver and transmitter boards to easily achieve and evaluate USB PD operation. ROHM Semiconductor www.rohm.com WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Price

FIRST ��

Starts from

`50,800

ESTYLE

EFY BUREAU

Apple iPad Pro Featuring redesigned Retina display The much-awaited 26.7cm (10.5-inch) Apple iPad Pro is now available in India. The model ships with iOS 10 and comes with the new Files app, customisable dock, improved multitasking, and deeper integration of Apple Pencil. Featuring ProMotion technology, it can refresh at rates of up to 120Hz for ﬂuid scrolling, greater responsiveness and smoother motion content. The Retina display is claimed to be the brightest iPad display yet. iPad Pro is powered by the new 64-bit A10X Fusion chip with six-core CPU alongside 12-core GPU under the hood. It also sports iPhone 7-like camera system—a 12-megapixel rear camera with optical image stabiliser and a 7-megapixel FaceTime HD camera. The four-speaker audio system can offer clear and rich stereo sound. Connectivity options include Wi-Fi 802.11ac and LTE Advanced. The new model also features Apple’s Touch ID and enables payments through Apple Pay.

Samsung Galaxy On Max Smartphone

Price `16,900

Tailor-made for low-light photography With Samsung Galaxy On Max smartphone, click brilliant photographs under all light conditions and share them on-the-go with a single click. The phone includes powerful 13MP front and rear cameras, with f/1.7 aperture on the rear camera. Available exclusively on Flipkart, the smartphone enhances the overall experience of clicking and sharing images with live ﬁlters and cool Indian-themed stickers. The phone also features Samsung Pay Mini—a simple, secure and almost everywhere payment system. Galaxy On Max is powered by a 2.39GHz, 1.69GHz octa-core processor, a 3300mAh battery and 4GB of RAM. The 32GB internal memory and a micro-SD slot expandable up to 256GB provide huge storage space. The phone has a 14.5cm (5.7-inch) full HD display, and comes in black and gold colours.

122cm Full HD Smart TV With inbuilt 10W + 10W box speakers

Smart Touch-Screen Mirror Updates you with feeds from Facebook and Twitter, and news from leading publications Nuovo has introduced a touch-screen ‘Smart Mirror’ that reﬂects more than just a face. It can keep you updated with notiﬁcations from social sites like Facebook and Twitter. You can get the latest news from leading publications, access YouTube videos, and even book cab through Uber. In addition to this, this smart mirror will always keep you on top of your daily schedule with the help of Google Calendar, and access e-mails. You can control the app to be displayed on the mirror for easy access through the mirror as well as mobile application. You need to install it in the place of choice Price with a dedicated UPS Not available connected, a Wi-Fi connection and Smart Mirror app downloaded. Once the app is downloaded, register yourself by signing up and syncing all the apps by allowing them to access the information. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Daiwa’s newest 122cm (48-inch) smart LED TV, L50FVC5N, packs a dual-core processor, and 1GB RAM and 8GB internal memory, so it is powerful enough to run multiple applications. The TV works with a smart web cruiser remote, which also has an inbuilt mouse. The remote allows comfortable typing with Qwerty keypad and mouse control. In sync with the faster performance, the TV comes with a unique feature that kills the apps running in the background when not in use. Closing down these apps not only frees the RAM but also optimises the TV’s performance. The Android-based operating system allows streaming of any channel at any time. Project any digital content from your gadget’s drive right onto your television with the screen mirroring facility or M.Cast.

Price `31,990

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FIRST LOOK

Price ` 132,995 to ` 202,995 depending on the model

Full Frame Camera Give your photography a ‘sense of genius’

Canon’s EOS 6D Mark II DSLR camera is set to empower stunning and versatile expressions of photography. Featuring a 26.2MP full-frame CMOS sensor, the camera delivers exceptionally clear images even under low light conditions. It is equipped with dual-pixel CMOS AF technology for high-performance focus tracking in Live View mode as well as DIGIC 7 image processor for high image quality even in dimly-lit situations. Versatile vari-angle touch panel gives users the ﬂexibility of shooting from a high or low angle. The EOS 6D Mark II supports a continuous shooting speed of up to 6.5fps, which promises sharp image capture of even fast-moving subjects. In Live View mode, continuous shooting speed is up to an impressive 4fps. With Wi-Fi and NFC connectivity, users can transfer images and videos from the camera to the smart devices and upload them onto the Canon Image Gateway, social media platforms and cloud storage.

Portable One-box Audio System Party anywhere with Sony MHC-V50D Sony India has added a new product to its one-box audio line-up, MHC V50D. Catering to all party lovers, the system features plug-in guitar and karaoke mode, illuminated LED touch panel, intuitive operation with motion control, high-quality audio via NFC and Bluetooth technology, DJ function with music centre and party lighting. The speaker is embedded with an option for built-in DVD/CD player, USB port, audio input and HDMI output and also comes with a built-in FM radio tuner. As a powerful wireless audio device, MHCV50D produces impressive 660W audio output.

Price `33,990

Wireless Presenter Just point, press and impress iBall Presento 60 multi-functional presenter device comes in a slim design with six buttons and an in-built laser pointer. The design is extremely comfortable to hold and has a clip for your comfort to carry along. Be in control from the ﬁrst slide to last with intuitive slideshow controls, as the buttons assist you in taking your presentations forward and backward. Volume buttons on sides act as volume controller. You can also blank the Price screen to focus `2799 audience attention on your most important points during the presentation. The remote allows access to Hyperlinks on a single point. Intuitive controls and red laser point make presentations a snap, even in the darkest auditorium. With a simple plugand-play USB interface, the device is no less than a remote control for the users. It also houses a cordless receiver for easy portability.

GizMo ByTes Gionee A1 gets a new update Gionee has rolled-out a new over-the-air (OTA) update for its A1 device that allows users to capture moments of togetherness with panoramic pictures and HD sel�e videos without having to squeeze to �t into the frame. Additionally, the update also offers visual guidance to the users.

App to create digital billboard messaging Developed by Patrick Mimran, who turned around Lamborghini in the ‘80s, the new Aphos app is a free messaging system that allows users anywhere in the world to create their own billboard with quotes, aphorisms and comments about art, politics, news, fashion, music or any subject related to their daily lives and interests. They can publish billboards on the app for Aphos followers, send billboards to friends via email, and share them using Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Pinterest or other social media sites.

Aadhaar integration now available on Skype Lite With the latest version of Skype Lite, Aadhaar (India’s national ID) integration can be used to verify users’ identity online, helping them communicate more securely with others. Either party can request Aadhaar veri�cation over a video call using Skype Lite. In order to con�rm your identity, you’ll need to click on ‘Verify Aadhaar identity,’ enter your 12-digit Aadhaar number and then authenticate with a one-time password sent via SMS. Once validated, you can choose to share pre-selected Aadhaar information with the other person to con�rm your identity.

Google introduces news feed based on your searches Google is rolling out a personalised stream of articles, videos, and other content. The feed will appear in its �agship app for Android and iOS, simply called Google. The feed includes content drawn from users’ search history and topics they choose to follow. Google hopes users will begin opening its app the way they do Facebook or Twitter.

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How To STREAM VIDEOS From Your MOBILE TO TV SCREEN EFY BUREAU

I

f you want to play videos and other media from your mobile phone or laptop on the big screen of your television, you have come to the right place! Most of the casting devices out there in the market implement similar setup process with slight variations in the hardware and installation. Chromecast is one of the most popular devices available for the purpose of remote streaming. The process of setting it up is simple and takes very little time to execute.

The setup process As you take the Chromecast device out of its box, you will notice an HDMI extension on it. For the ease of explanation, we will consider here an HD television with HDMI port as the standard display device. The setup steps follow: 1. Connect Chromecast’s HDMI extension to the HDMI port on the TV 2. Connect Chromecast to the USB charger as well in order to ensure that the device has enough charge during the setup process 3. Select the HDMI channel on your TV by pressing ‘Source’ or ‘Input’ on your remote (or TV). Find the correct HDMI channel from the various options available. You will get the Chromecast welcome screen along with the device name and a website URL from where you can download the necessary application 4. Now, set up the network from your control device. If you plan to use your smartphone or tablet (iOS or Android), simply download Google Home application from Google Play Store and open it. If you are using a WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Things you need to get started 1. 2. 3. 4.

Chromecast device Google Home mobile application Mobile app supporting cast option Display device (TV or monitor) with HDMI port 5. Control device (smartphone, tablet or computer) 6. USB charger

Chromecast alternatives You can get a variety of devices other than Chromecast for streaming to your TV. A few among these include: 1. Teewe 2 2. Samsung All Share Cast 3. Roku Streaming Stick 4. Amazon Fire TV 5. WD TV Live 6. Apple TV

computer (Windows or Mac), visit the URL displayed on the screen, download Google Home application in your computer and open it 5. On your phone or tablet, go to the menu of Google Home application and select Devices�Connect to Devices. Your Chromecast device is detected by the application. Minimise the application window and go to your Wi-Fi settings. You will see a Chromecast network listed. Connect to the network and go back to Google Home application. This step is not required if you use a computer 6. On continuing in the application, it will connect with your Chromecast device through a passcode, which is displayed both on your application as well as TV screen. Once the application detects

the device, it allows you to select your Wi-Fi home network and rename your device. Provide your Wi-Fi credentials. Now, with the application as well as the Chromecast device set up, connect to your home network on the TV 7. Now you are ready to cast your mobile screen to your TV. Use an application that has the Cast option (for example, YouTube), or use the Google Chrome browser. While using the browser, ensure you have added the Chromecast extension to your browser, which you will be able to do once you successfully set up your Chromecast device 8. To connect Chrome to your Chromecast, click Chromecast extension tab, then choose your Chromecast device. This allows you to display your current tab on your TV

Connecting with your Google Home device for voice command If you have a Google Home device connected to the same home network as your Google Chromecast, you can voice control your casting options. Simply go to Google Home application and click ‘Devices.’ You will see the Google Chromecast device with option ‘Enable Voice Control and More.’ Choose this option. You can customise your casting options from Google Home menu�More Options. Your Chromecast is now ready to stream your mobile/laptop screen to your television. Keep in mind that the mobile application should have the ‘Cast’ option available. Else, you can use Google Chrome browser. So sit back and enjoy. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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Choosing The BEST SMARTPHONE Under ` 10,000

I

f you want a smartphone with the best of features but not costing more than ` 10,000, this guide can help you get the best value for your money. It explains what the different smartphone speciﬁcations represent and what’s available from various brands.

Processor Paromik Chakraborty is a technical journalist at EFY

A Mediatek MT6589 quadcore processor for base-level smartphones (Image ��

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Processor makes your smartphone run the functions you want. It consists of multiple units called ‘cores.’ The more the number of cores, the better the work division the processor can carry out. As a result, it becomes easier for the phone to run multiple applications at a time without any hiccups. The smartphone’s performance also depends on the processor’s clock speed, which is measured in gigahertz (GHz). This, in turn, utilises the number of bits labelled on the processor to perform a function in a given time. Processors are usually 32-bit or 64-bit—the higher the bit count, the more the data it can handle at a clock beat. Again, the higher the clock speed, the more the actions utilising the bits. So, for example, a 2.4GHz octa-core processor works better than a 1.2GHz octa-core processor, and a 2.4GHz 64-bit chip is better than a 2.4GHz 32-bit chip. In the market, you will ﬁnd smartphones with different processor options, the majority of which use Snapdragon and Mediatek. Mediatek is an adequate processor choice for low-budget phones, given its low power consumption and high load capacity at reasonable price. Snapdragon chipsets are usually used in comparatively costlier phones. Improved performance and efﬁciency make Snapdragon a good catch. Quite a few low-budget phones incorporate Spreadtrum processors. System-on-chip technology brings the whole system—including the graphic processing unit (GPU)—to the processor. Snapdragon proces-

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

sors come with Adreno GPU, while Mediatek or Exynos processors carry a Mali unit. GPU performance can be judged from its version and benchmark tests.

RAM Random access memory (RAM) is responsible for the ease of information retrieval— eliminating for the system the need to access the storage or SD card to run an application. RAM holds the running as well as background apps for quick access when the app is run the next time. Consequently, it greatly eases the load on the system, allowing the phone to run smoother. Operating system (OS) and user interface (UI) occupy a big chunk of the RAM. The remaining space is used by applications to work. So, the bigger the RAM, the greater will be the capacity to perform applications. Look out for a phone with at least 2GB RAM.

Display Display brightness is important for a vibrant and realistic viewing experience as well as comfortable viewing outdoors. LCD screens have been a long-time reliable companion for smartphones. The new AMOLED displays offer better colour contrasts. With recent upgrades, these are now readable in sunlight too. The resolution of a smartphone is determined not only by its pixel measurement but also by its screen size—combining which you can get an idea of the pixel density, that is, the number of pixels ﬁtting per square inch of the phone screen. Higher pixel density is desirable to get a better image. Generally, low-end smartphones have either HD (1280x720-pixel) or Full HD (1920x1080-pixel) resolution. Screen size of 12.7cm (5 inches) is the best ﬁt if you want the phone to be compact yet comfortable to use.

Battery life Don’t settle for a phone with battery capacity WWW.EFYMAG.COM

BUYERS’ GUIDE of less than 3000 milliampere-hour (mAh). Though the battery life depends majorly on the extent of use, a 3000mAh battery will ensure one day of moderate use, including running applications, 4G connectivity as well as photo/video capture. In fact, you can also ﬁnd a few options featuring a massive 4000mAh battery within your tight budget.

LTE support, camera and storage Go for a 4G-compatible handset as 4G connection has become the norm today with major telecom operators rolling out their 4G networks. Note that some phones may or may not support multiple SIMs, so decide as per your needs. Budget phones today offer an internal storage of 32GB and an expansion slot, which should be your ideal base expectation. The general perception is that the megapixel capacity of a camera is the indicator of its quality. While it is true to some extent, the other major factor is the aperture, which is the diameter of the camera lens opening. Larger aperture can capture more light and thus render sharper pictures. The aperture is represented as an ‘f’ number, such as f/1.8, f/2.2 and so on. The lower the numeric value in the denominator, the bigger the aperture. For instance, f/1.8 denotes a bigger aperture than f/2.2. A bigger aperture covers a bigger ﬁeld of image, but loses the sharpness if a single object is to be focused on. Smaller apertures are better for focusing on individual objects, delivering greater image sharpness.

Options in the Indian market Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 base model. The Redmi Note 4 by Xiaomi is a powerpacked phone that gives you full value for your money. It runs Android Marshmallow and comes with a strong Snapdragon 625 octa-core 2GHz processor with an Adreno 506 GPU, 2GB RAM, 32GB internal storage, full HD 14cm (5.5-inch) screen and 4100mAh battery. It has a 4G SIM slot and a hybrid slot that can support either another 4G SIM WWW.EFYMAG.COM

or an external memory card expandable up to 128 GB. Additional features include a 13MP f/2.0 rear camera and a 5MP f/2.0 front camera, and a ﬁngerprint sensor. The phone is priced at ` 9999. Panasonic Eluga Ray X. Eluga Ray X, from Panasonic, features a Mediatek MT6737 quad-core 1.3GHz processor with ARM Mali T720 GPU, 3GB RAM, 32GB internal memory and a 4000mAh battery. It supports dual 4G SIM. The dedicated SD card slot is expandable up to 64GB. The phone has a 14cm (5.5-inch) HD screen, and a 13MP rear camera as well as a 5MP front camera. One major USP of the device is its own AI assistant, Arbo, which learns and automates scheduled functions and locations based on the user’s daily activities and whereabouts. The phone is priced at ` 8999. Lenovo K6 Power. Lenovo K6 Power sports a Snapdragon 430 processor with 1.4GHz quad-core and 1.1GHz quad-core power combined, Adreno 505 GPU, 3GB RAM and 32GB internal memory expandable up to 128GB. The 4000mAh battery-powered device supports dual 4G SIM, and features a 12.7cm screen with full HD display and two cameras (a 13MP rear camera and an 8MP front camera). The device costs ` 9999. Moto C Plus. Motorola’s Moto C plus includes Mediatek MT6737 quadcore 1.3GHz processor with a Mali-T720 M2 GPU, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal memory with 32GB expansion option, 720p HD 12.7cm display, and an 8MP rear camera and a 2MP front camera. The phone is powered by a 4000mAh battery, and supports dual 4G SIM. It runs the latest Android version, Android 7.0. Moto C plus is priced at ` 6999.

The ﬁnal word Choices are deﬁnitely not limited to the above-mentioned list. You can also check out the newly released 5000mAh battery-powered Moto E4 Plus, Yu Yureka with 4GB RAM and Redmi 4 amongst other options. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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UL K MU GI & STA EO U R I TH N SA

DO-IT-YOURSELF

FAN SPEED INCREASING REGULATOR Using PIC16F73 PROF. K. PADMANABHAN oltage dips in mains supply make fans run very slow, leaving you sweaty through hot summers, especially if you don’t own an air-conditioner (AC). Voltage may also dip because of an AC drawing a large current, causing the fan to slow down. The so-called fan regulators ﬁtted on the switchboard for speed control merely reduce the fan speed, not increase it. Earlier, regulators used to have resistors that got connected in series with the fan to drop the voltage and hence the speed. These had a rotating switch with steps 1 to 5 to set the speed below normal, and were ﬁtted on the panel board along with the fan switch, light switch and other power outlet sockets. Nowadays regulators use triac to slice the AC waveform and thereby provide an effective drop in voltage and hence speed. These regulators are small in size and can be ﬁtted along with switches compactly. At present, there is no fan regulator which can actually increase the fan speed beyond its maximum when required. To increase the fan speed, you can increase the voltage, but that is not feasible. Connecting an auto-transformer with boost voltage increases the speed somewhat, but that is not worth the effort. Usually, fans run at maximum speeds of around 300rpm, but at low voltages, the speed drops by more than 35 per cent. Ceiling fan motors have about 18 poles or more. The full or synchronous speed of the fan motor is given by: 120 f/p where ‘f’ is the mains supply frequency and ‘p’ the number of poles. The running speed is much less than this value.

V

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the motor reduces, and that is good for efﬁcient working of the fan’s motor. The magnetic power loss does not increase much. Thus, a method is needed to provide variable-frequency mains voltage derived power for the fan. This power has to be generated in as compact, economical Fig. 1: Pulse width changes as per the sine waveform and simple manner as possible. There are power modules availThus a fan’s maximum speed can able for varying the speed of inducbe increased only by increasing the tion motors. These use insulatedfrequency of the alternating current gate bipolar transistors and are supplied to the fan. Increasing this quite expensive. frequency to 60Hz or even 65Hz will make the fan run much faster and PWM-based variable-frequency produce a good air throw. power If a 330rpm fan is supplied with only 70 per cent of the mains voltage The best method for generating due to a voltage dip, the torque of variable frequency in the range of the motor reduces to half its full-volt45 to 65 Hz is pulse-width modulaage torque value. The torque needed tion (PWM). Pulse widths change to drive the fan blades is proportionas per the sine waveform shown in al to the square of the speed. So the Fig. 1. The pulse sequence should be speed drops to 70 per cent when the generated by the microcontroller. In torque drops to half its full value. this project, the pulses (PWM1 and But, if you increase the frequency PWM2) alternately appear on two to 60Hz with the same reduced pins of the PIC microcontroller (refer voltage, the speed increases 20 per Fig. 5). The timing of the pulses will cent due to the increase in frequency be constant for a given frequency. from 50 to 60 Hz, which makes the The pulse sequence timing deterspeed drop by only 10 per cent of the mines the frequency. nominal 330rpm. If you increase the When pulses of current pass frequency to 65 per cent, the fan will through the fan’s inductive windrun even faster. ing, the current averages to sinewave Increase in frequency does not shape. Pulse discontinuities get affect the fan’s motor much. Actuﬁltered by the fan inductance. To ally, at the increased frequency, the generate the sine wave, two such magnetic ﬂux density in the iron of pulse trains are required, one for the WWW.EFYMAG.COM

DO-IT-YOURSELF positive half wave and the other for the negative half wave. For example, to generate a 60Hz waveform, each half cycle is 8ms long. In this time, you have to produce a pulse sequence. If you use 16 pulses for one half cycle (actually, we use much more), the time for each pulse is 0.5ms. In this time, the duty cycle or pulse width will vary from 0.1ms to 0.45ms in accordance with the sine wave shape. Such a waveform is shown in Fig. 2. It shows the PWM pin output waveform from PIC16F73 microcontroller for generating one half cycle of a sine waveform of about 60Hz frequency. The pulses are so close that their widths cannot be seen individually. The sine wave peak is brighter, as the width is greater in the middle. The ﬁltered current output would be sine shaped for each half cycle. If you change the time of each pulse to 0.625ms, the same 16 pulses will take a time of 10ms per half cycle, generating a 50Hz sine waveform. Just 16 pulses will give sufﬁciently good wave shapes. To change the period of the sine waveform, use the sine look-up table, which shows 16 points per half cycle. The values are: Sin(n×�)/16 For n=1 to 16. The scaling is done by multiplying these values by 128. These are the look-up table entries. If you take the table value and output it as a width on PWM pin, 16 such points will take only a few milliseconds. In order to vary the frequency, each of the table values is output as pulse width more than once. The number of times each table value is repeated determines the period. For period variation, a potentiometer is used to apply a variable voltage to the analogue digital converter of the microcontroller. The converted value ranges from 1 to 255. It is divided by 16 to give values 1 to 16. Subtracting these values from number 25 gives 24 to 9 for the potmeter range. Each of the table points is repeated 24 times for the slowest speed. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Fig. 2: The PWM pin output waveform from a DSP embedded controller for generating one half cycle of a sine waveform of about 60Hz frequency. The pulses are so close that their widths cannot be seen individually. The sine wave peak is brighter, as the width is greater in the middle

�� other half cycles similarly

Fig. 3(b): The same waveform after frequency is increased to 65Hz. The above waves are taken on two PWM pins. The wave in the negative half cycle positions corresponds to the other PWM output pin

For the fastest speed, each table point is repeated only nine times. Nine times 16 points give one half cycle. So, if you take the fastest speed to be 66Hz, it is a period of 15/2ms for one half cycle. Thus, the time of picking each table value and outputting it on the PWM pin as width-modulated pulse becomes 7.5/(9x16)ms or about 52 microseconds. Timer 2 interrupt of PIC16F73 microcontroller is initialised to operate once every 52 microseconds.

Thus, each timer interrupt picks the table entry and loads the period register of the PWM. That generates a pulse on pins 12 and 13 of PIC16F73. The ﬁltered output appears as shown in Fig. 3. The program is written in Assembly language, and the hex ﬁle is created using MPLAB integrated development environment (IDE) or Oshon PIC simulator IDE. The conﬁguration byte is 52H for the 20MHz crystal used in the PIC circuit. The ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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DO-IT-YOURSELF program is loaded into the chip using PICKIT2 programmer. The ﬁle can be imported by the PICKIT2 programmer as a hex ﬁle and the conﬁguration byte entered by clicking Conﬁguration option.

H-Bridge circuit Before you decide on the DSP embedded controller and the way it is connected and programmed to generate such waveforms of pulses, let us take a look at the way sine wave current pulses are sent to the motor and its windings. The winding must receive current pulses for both positive and negative half cycles. But we generate only two sets of pulses and these must be passed into the motor winding in the forward and reverse directions during the positive and negative half cycles, respectively. In other words, you have to reverse the direction of current for the negative half-cycle pulse train. For this, the motor windings are connected in the form of an H-bridge (as shown in Fig. 4) to the DC supply with switches to direct the pulses. In Fig. 4, the mains voltage (170V to 240V) is rectiﬁed by two diodes and converted into positive and negative DC voltages with respect to the neutral line of the AC supply. The circuit is only a half-wave rectiﬁer. During positive half cycles, diode D1 conducts and charges C1. During negative half cycles, diode D2 conducts to charge capacitor C2. Both capacitors are large-value electrolytic capacitors, each of which must be at least 470µF, 400V in order to avoid considerable ripple on the direct current rails. Thus, you have two DC rails, one for positive and the other for negative voltages. When the mains supply (say, 200V) is rectiﬁed by a diode, the peak voltage of the capacitor is 200x�2=282V. So C1 and C2 are high-voltage (400V) electrolytic capacitors. All computer SMPS boards use these invariably. The H-bridge conﬁguration used 106

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

LINE

advisable to increase the frequency for the fan motor beyond this value.

D1

Generating the AC sine voltage at variable frequency

S1 C1

FAN NEUTRAL

C2 S2 D2

Fig. 4: Semi H-bridge circuit with the load (fan)

here is actually a semi-H-bridge. Like a Wheatstone bridge, it has four arms. The two arms on the left side have capacitors C1 and C2, with the centre junction taken out. The right side consists of two switches (S1 and S2) one below the other connected between the positive and negative DC rails. There is a junction point between the two switches. The load, the fan in our case, is to be connected between the two junctions. Switches S1 and S2 in Fig. 4 are actually transistors (bipolar, MOSFET or IGBT). You can select suitable transistors according to the rating needed and at the lowest cost. At a time, only one of the switches is turned on. Let’s say, the waveform of pulse sequence shown in Fig. 1 is used to turn on switch S1. Current will ﬂow from the positive side to the switch and then through the fan load to the junction point of C1 and C2. The ﬂow of current is from right to left through the load. This current constitutes the positive half cycle. When switch S2 is turned on using the second set of pulse sequence, the current will ﬂow from left to right side of the load. This current constitutes the negative half cycle. In this manner, the alternating current of the frequency generated by the PWM waves will be applied to the fan. When you apply 60Hz, the motor speed increases. Using the microcontroller, you can vary the frequency from 40 to 70Hz. It is not

The variable-frequency sinusoidal waveform is generated for positive and negative half cycles by closing switches S1 and S2 alternately. S1 is switched on and off as per the pulses from PWM1, whose width varies as per Fig. 1 to ﬁt the sine wave shape. This goes for one half cycle time, which is 20ms for 50Hz current, 16ms for 60Hz current and so on. Then, the next half cycle is obtained by sending current, using switch S2, in the opposite direction through the motor coil. Switch S2 is also repeatedly closed and opened as per the pulses coming from PWM2 pin. Now the main challenge is to choose the transistors for S1 and S2. If IGBTs or MOSFETs are used, switching S1 ‘on’ is not easy. So bipolar transistor version is chosen here. You can preferably use Darlington bipolar transistor rated 350V or more. Transistor MJE5742 is a good choice with its voltage rating of 400V, gain of 100 and maximum current rating of 8A. But, it is expensive. So a compromise has to be made. In order to switch on the transistors using PWM pulses, use of optoisolators is necessary. Optoisolators have an LED and a photo-transistor in one package, usually 6-pin DIP. When the pulses of current are sent to the LED in the optoisolator through a resistor, the phototransistor inside turns on. This transistor is connected across the collector to the base of the switching transistor. So, each pulse turns on the switch for the duration equal to the pulse width and passes current through the motor coil connected between the two junction points—switches and capacitors as in Fig. 4. The choice of the optoisolator is critical in two ways. First, it should have a phototransistor resistance such that adequate current ﬂows WWW.EFYMAG.COM

DO-IT-YOURSELF +5V PWM1 VR1

EMBEDDED CONTROLLER CIRCUIT (PIC16F73)

ON GND UP

OPTO− ISOLATION CIRCUITRY (H11D1)

PWM2

MAINS DIODES

230V AC INPUT

FAN

DOWN

REMOTE CONTROL

IR DETECTOR UNIT

H−BRIDGE

Fig. 5: Block diagram of the fan speed increasing regulator

3

R10 680E

IC1 7805

1

2

R9 10K

C2 0.1u

1 2

LED1 POWER

C3

XTAL1 20MHz

15p

S1 VR1 10k

ON/OFF

BATT.1 9V

C1

RB7

28

RB6

4

RA2

RB5

26

RB4 IC2 RA4 RB3 PIC16F73

25

5 6

RA3

RA5

RB2

23

OSC1

RB1

22

10

OSC2

RB0

21

RC0

RC7

18

RC1

RC6

17

RC2

RC5

16

RC3

RC4

15

Vss

Vss

19

12

8

100E

1

6

2 5 3 4

24

9

14

R1

RA0 RA1

13

470u 16V

20

27

11

R2 100E

VDD

3

7

C4 15p

MCLR

R3

IC3 H11D1 1

1K

6

2 5 3 4

R4 1K

IC4 H11D1 GND

F1 1.5A

L

N

R5 10E, 5W

D1 1N4007 C5

CON1 FOR 230V AC 50 Hz

470u 400V

C7 1n

C8 1n D2 1N4007

C6 470u 400V R6 10E , 5W

T1 MJE13005 D3 BA159

R7 10K

ZD1 5V 0.5W

D4 BA159 R8 10K

T2 MJE13005 ZD2 5V 0.5W

CON2 FOR FAN

Fig. 6: Circuit diagram of the fan speed increasing regulator

through the base of the switching transistor. Second, its off-state voltage rating must be 300V. Such optoisolators with 300V rating are available for the phototransistor’s VCE value. These include H11D1, SDD400H, SFH618A-5 and HCPL2503, from several manufacturers. Triac drive optoisolator MOC3020 can also be used. WWW.EFYMAG.COM

Circuit and working Having seen how the switches are turned on by PWM1 and PWM2 pulses so as to generate variablefrequency sine wave current into the coil, the block diagram shown in Fig. 5 can be followed easily. Use of an IR remote is optional. The complete circuit diagram

without IR remote control unit is shown in Fig. 6. It has a PIC16F73 chip programmed with the code written in Assembly language. PWM pulses coming from its pins 12 and 13 have to be checked on a scope. An R-C ﬁlter can be used to see the sine waveform as shown in Fig. 2. By varying potentiometer VR1, you can change the frequency of the sine wave. ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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Fig. 7: Actual-size PCB layout of the fan speed increasing regulator

PWM pulses are fed to H11D1 optoisolators. For ceiling and table fan loads, if H11D1 optoisolator is used, switching transistors can be MJE13005 or 3039. The upper section of fan speed controller circuit (shown in Fig. 6) is safe as it works on low voltage only. But after mains supply is given to the bridge, it is dangerous to touch any part of the circuit. Turn on the circuit using VR1 with its knob. In Fig. 6, the bottom section of the circuit shows the connection to 230V AC mains power. 1N4007 diodes are used for the fan load as 108

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Fig. 8: Components layout for the PCB

these have high inductance. The circuit is very simple to wire. You can even assemble it on a breadboard as transistors are 3-pin TO220 type. Use suitable heat-sinks for transistors T1 and T2. After wiring the circuit, switch on the AC mains power. It is advisable to use a variable auto transformer ﬁrst and vary the voltage slowly from 140V. Otherwise, the fuse may blow up at startup if there is any wiring fault. Connect the fan to the circuit through a suitable connector. For a ceiling fan already ﬁtted in your

room, the connections from the fan should be isolated and brought to the circuit through a long twin-ﬂex wire for testing. The fan must run at the speed controlled by VR1. Fan speed increases in eight steps through VR1 adjustment. VR1 should be set to the maximum value ﬁrst to get a slower speed for start. Then it can be brought downwards to increase the fan speed. It’s not possible to observe the output voltage waveform on a scope, as the oscilloscope’s earth point should not receive hot voltWWW.EFYMAG.COM

EFY Note The source code of this project is included in this month’s EFY DVD and is also available for free download at source. efymag.com

PARTS LIST Semiconductors:

IC1 IC2 IC3, IC4 �� T1, T2

� � � -

7805, 5V regulator PIC 16F73 microcontroller H11D1 optoisolator �� MJE13005 power transistor

Resistors (all 1/4-watt, ±5% carbon, unless stated otherwise):

R1, R2 R3, R4 R5, R6 R7-R9 R10 VR1

-

100-ohm 1-kilo-ohm 10-ohm, 5W 10-kilo-ohm 680-ohm 10-kilo-ohm, 16mm plastic shaft potmeter with on/off switch

-

470µF, 25V electrolytic 0.1µF ceramic 15pF ceramic 470µF, 400V electrolytic 1nF, 1kV ceramic

Capacitors:

C1 C2 C3, C4 C5, C6 C7, C8 Miscellaneous:

F1 BATT.1

- 1.5A glass fuse - 9V PP3 battery with connector CON1, CON2 - 2-pin connector terminal S1 - On/off switch (VR1) XTAL1 - 20MHz crystal oscillator - Fan - Heat-sinks for IC1, T1 �� - 28-pin socket for PIC IC � ��

ages. You need to use an isolation transformer for the scope, ensuring that you don’t touch the oscilloscope’s input pin. Otherwise, a small transformer (230V primary to 9V secondary) can be connected in lieu of or in parallel to the fan and the secondary voltage (9V) observed for waveshape and frequency. This method was used by the author for creating the positive and negative DC rails and it showed a good sine wave shape with some ﬂoating ripples of 50Hz, as the mains supply is not full-wave rectiﬁed and the WWW.EFYMAG.COM

DO-IT-YOURSELF capacitors used are also only 470µF electrolytic. This does not affect the fan’s working speed anyhow.

Construction and testing An actual-size PCB layout for the fan speed increasing regulator is shown in Fig. 7 and its components layout in Fig. 8. After assembling the circuit, enclose it in a suitable box. Follow the testing steps given below: 1. After checking the circuit for proper connections, connect a 9V battery and switch on the circuit using VR1. LED1 on the board should glow. 2. Check pins 12 and 13 of PIC16F73 chip for pulse output. For this, use a logic probe or a CRO, if available. Pulse-widths vary as you vary VR1. You can notice a small voltage of 0.2V or so on pin 1 of each of H11D1 chip with respect to the negative of the 9V battery supply. That means the variable PWM sine waveform is correctly generated by the chip. 3. Now connect a fan to CON2 connector. Make sure you turn on the inbuilt fan switch. 4. Connect 230V mains supply to CON1. It is advisable to use a variable auto transformer and apply 140V ﬁrst, to see the fan running. Varying VR1 clockwise will increase the fan’s speed in steps. The fan can be switched off by turning back VR1 and switching off its built-in on/off switch. 5. If the fan does not run, the fuse blows up or 10-ohm resistors heat up. Check the transistors using a multimeter for emitter-collector short-circuit on both sides in that case. Caution. Since this circuit works on 230V AC mains voltage, extreme caution is required while testing it. Wearing surgical rubber gloves is advisable to avoid electric shock. Prof. K. Padmanabhan is professor (Retd) from Alagappa College of Technology, Guindy, Chennai

� www.lulu.com � www.magzter.com � Createspace.com � www.readwhere.com

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. S.C DI IVE W D

BENCH POWER SUPPLY Using A Computer’s Power Supply JAYWARDHAN PANDIT good bench power supply is the most vital equipment for electronics engineers and hobbyists. However, bench power supplies used in R&D labs are costly. Output rating is also a major issue. A variable DC supply up to 30V with a few amperes current is the basic requirement for labs. Making a power supply for use in labs is not an easy task due to the complexity of the circuit. To provide high current outputs, it needs heavy transformers and semiconductor

A

devices. A simple alternative is to use a computer power supply unit (PSU). With some modiﬁcations, the PSU can be turned into a good bench power supply. Fig. 1 shows input and output ratings of an ATX computer PSU. The available outputs are +3.3V (20A), +5V (34A), +12V (16A), -5V (0.5A), -12V (0.5A) and +5VSB (2A). These outputs are available on one 20-pin Molex connector (some newer PSUs have 24-pin connector) and four various other 4-pin connectors. A 20-pin Molex connector is shown in Fig. 2. Wire colour codes of standard ATX PSU connector are shown in the table below. From the table, you can identify voltage outputs corresponding to different colour codes.

Power up and testing To test a computer PSU without connecting it to the motherboard, short its green wire to any of the black wires (ground wires). The power supply’s cooling fan should turn on to indicate that the power supply is ‘on.’ Now you can check the voltFig. 1: Input and output ratings of an ATX computer PSU

Fig. 2: 20-pin ATX Molex connector

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AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

ages of all the different wires with respect to black wire by using a multimeter. If all the voltages are as per the colour code table, the power supply is working ﬁne. Another method is to check the voltage of grey wire, which is a PGS or power-good signal. It should be +5V approx.

Opening the power supply unit As you know, computers work on 230V AC power. To open the PSU enclosure, ﬁrst disconnect its 230V supply cord. After you unscrew the PSU enclosure and remove the cover, be careful of large capacitors on the PCB. Wait for a while or discharge them using a proper discharging tool. Otherwise, you run the risk of getting an electric shock from capacitors. You will see that all the samecolour wires are bundled together and soldered in one place on the PCB. The PCB is also marked with legends for their voltage and signals.

Modifications Fixed outputs. Since the outputs available on various PSU connectors

COLOUR CODES OF PSU WIRES Colour code

Voltage/Signal

Description

Yellow

12V

+12V DC

Red

5V

+5V DC

Orange

3.3V

+3.3V DC

Green

PS_ON

Power Supply On (active-low)

Blue

-12V

-12V DC

White

-5V

-5V DC

Purple

+5VSB

+5V DC standby voltage

Grey

PGS (+5V)

Power–good signal (+5V DC when outputs are ok)

Black

Common

Ground

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DO-IT-YOURSELF +12V –12V +5V +3.3V PS_ON 5VSB

R1

220 Ohms PGS GND

LED1 LED2

R2

1Amp Fuse Fig. 4: Author’s prototype with internal connections ��

are meant for connections to the motherboard, the connections need to be slightly modiﬁed for use of the unit as a bench power supply. All the required connections for ﬁxed but multiple outputs are shown in Fig. 3 and the author’s prototype of the same is shown in Fig. 4. Front panel of the author’s prototype is shown in Fig. 5. Power-on switch. The green wire in ATX is PS_ON or ‘power supply on’ wire. It is used by the motherboard to turn on the PSU. Normally, its voltage level is +5V DC. To turn on the PSU, it needs to be grounded. So you need to connect an on/off switch between PS_ON and ground. Standby indicator. When AC power cord is plugged into 230V AC socket and power switch is in ‘off’ position, the PSU is in standby mode. To provide an indication for standby mode, connect an LED to purple wire, which provides a 5VSB signal from ATX PSU. 5VSB is active-high when the PSU is in standby mode. The voltage level of 5VSB is +5V DC, so you need to connect a 220-ohm, 0.25-watt resistor in series with the LED. As soon as power switch is operated to power-on the PSU, 5VSB goes low and the LED stops glowing, indicating that the PSU is WWW.EFYMAG.COM

in power-on mode. Power-on indicator. For poweron indication, you need to connect an LED to grey wire through a 220-ohm, 0.25-watt resistor. This grey wire provides PGS or powergood signal. In standby mode, this signal is active-low. After powering up the PSU, it becomes active-high (+5V DC). Series fuse. You may ask what’s the need of a series fuse when the PSU has a very good inbuilt shortcircuit protection. The fuse is used here not to protect the PSU but your valuable project. As you know, the current rating of the PSU is moderately high at more than 10 amperes. But in general, an average electronics project or circuit doesn’t need such high current. If there is any short circuit in your project, the short-circuit current will reduce to the level of the fuse current. Without a fuse, the short-circuit current will reach the maximum output current of the PSU, severely damaging the circuit. To make your power supply more effective, remove the PCB board from the PSU enclosure. Place it in a larger enclosure and mount banana sockets for different outputs. You can also use an ammeter in series with the output to

Fig. 5: Front panel of the author’s prototype

PARTS LIST-1 FOR FIG. 3 Semiconductors: LED1, LED2 - 5mm LED Resistors (all 1/4-watt, ±5% carbon): R1, R2 - 220-ohm Miscellaneous: - ATX power supply unit (PSU) - 1A fuse with holder - Five banana sockets - AC power cord for PSU

PARTS LIST-2 FOR FIG. 6 Semiconductors: IC1 - LM317 adjustable voltage regulator �� Resistors (all 1/4-watt, ±5% carbon): R1 - 120-ohm VR1 - 4.7-kilo-ohm potmeter Capacitors: C1 - 100µF, 40V electrolytic C2 - 10µF, 40V electrolytic Miscellaneous: - +12V from ATX - -12V from ATX - Heat-sink for LM317 - Banana sockets

ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

111

DO-IT-YOURSELF measure the load current onboard. 1N4007 D1 Variable-output power +1.2V TO +23V +12V IC1 2 3 supply. To convert the LM317 O/P1 I/P1 PSU into a variable power R1 1 C1 120E supply, use an LM338K or C2 INPUT 100u 10u VARIABLE LM317 adjustable voltVOLTAGE VOLTAGE 40V 40V age regulator IC as shown VR1 4.7k in Fig. 6. Connect +12V I/P2 O/P2 and -12V supplies from −12V the PSU to this circuit so Fig. 6: Adjustable regulated power supply circuit that you get 1.2V to +23V maximum output using VR1 potmeter. But the current output will reduce to 500mA because the output current of -12V output is 500mA only.

Construction and testing An actual-size PCB layout for variable power supply is shown in Fig. 7 and its components layout in Fig. 8. Some tips for testing the power supply are: 1. Some newer PSUs come with a current-sense wire. If the wire is grey in colour, connect it with +3.3V. If it is pink, connect it with +5V supply. 2. Make sure that you are using an ATX power supply. If it is an older one, it will have different colour codes for the wires. If you don’t have the actual colour code data, don’t try anything. 3. If the LEDs do not light up, check these for correct polarity. 4. The cooling fan in the PSU may make noise. As the PSU is not powering a load continuously, you can limit the fan speed to reduce the noise. You can do so by reducing the supply voltage from 12V to 5V. Consequently, if the PSU heats up abnormally, reconnect the fan with 12V supply. 5. It is recommended to connect a separate fuse for each output.

Advantages of PSU 1. Very effective short-circuit protection 2. Thermal protection 3. Earth fault protection 112

AUGUST 2017 | ELECTRONICS FOR YOU

Fig. 7: Actual-size PCB layout of the variable power supply circuit

Fig. 8: Components layout for the PCB

4. Compact size with respect to voltage and current output ratings 5. Very cheap compared to conventional bench power supplies

Disadvantages 1. Complex circuit, difﬁcult to repair without adequate knowledge 2. SMD soldering station may be required for repair Jaywardhan Pandit is an electronics hobbyist. His interests include embedded system and PCB designing

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SHU BHA G O SAK SAI M N S & S HI SHR , ANI E THE YA O

Arduino-Based SMARTPHONE CONTROLLED ROBOT CAR DR P.S. MANOHARAN AND S. NAVEEN owadays smartphones can be used to control a host of electrical and electronic devices including motors, music

systems and lights. Here we present an Arduino based robot car, which can be controlled using an Android smartphone having ArduinoRC application installed in it. This bot receives commands from your smartphone with the help of a Bluetooth module. The authors’ prototype is shown in Fig. 1.

N

Circuit and working The circuit diagram of Arduinobased smartphone-controlled car is shown in Fig. 2. Pin mapping of the Arduino Uno is shown in Fig. 3. The ATmega328 chip on the Arduino Uno board comes with a bootloader, which allows you to burn the program to the chip without an ex-

Fig. 1: Authors’ prototype

M2

M1

M1,M2=DC MOTOR 3 4

OUT1 GND

5

GND

12

GND

13

GND

6

14

11

OUT2

OUT4

OUT3

IC1 L293D

10

IN3

7

IN2

2

IN1

EN2

EN1

9

1

VCC1 16

Construction and testing

15

IN4

VCC2 8

7 6 5 4 3 2 TX 1 RX 0

GND 13 12 11 10 9 8

ATMEGA328

ANALOG A0 A1 A2 A3 A4 A5

DRIVER

DIGITAL

IOREF RST 3.3V 5V GND GND Vin

POWER INPUT

USB

AREF

BATT.2 12V

ARDUINO

BATT.1 9V

Fig. 2: Circuit diagram of Arduino-based smartphone-controlled car WWW.EFYMAG.COM

ternal hardware programmer. After the chip is programmed, it can be removed from the board. The board can be powered from USB connection or external power supply such as batteries or AC/DC adaptors. After connecting the power supply to Vin pin, you get regulated 5V and 3.3V DC on the respective pins of the Arduino board. 5V is used to power the HC-05 Bluetooth module. Serial pins 0 (RX) and 1 (TX) of Arduino are used to communicate with HC-05 module. Pins 4 through 7 are connected to H-bridge motor driver L293D IC. Out of these four pins, pins 5 and 6 provide 8-bit PWM output using analogWrite( ) function deﬁned in the asc_car.ino Arduino sketch. Pins 2 and 3 of Arduino (not used in this project) can be used for additional functions like controlling lights, horn, etc.

RX TX GND 5V CON1 FOR HC−05

A 9V battery supply is used to power the Arduino Uno with its positive terminal connected to Vin pin and negative terminal connected to GND pin. 5V and GND (ground) pins from the Arduino are connected to HC-05 Bluetooth module. RX (pin 0) and TX (pin 1) pins of the Arduino are connected to TX and RX pins of the HC-05 module, respectively. Pins 4 through 7 of the Arduino provide controlling signals for the motors. The Arduino outputs a very small voltage from these pins. So, an additional power supply is required to produce enough torque for the motors, for which H-Bridge L293D module is used. You can provide additional 12V power supply to pin 8 (VCC2) of L293D to ELECTRONICS FOR YOU | AUGUST 2017

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Fig. 3: Pin mapping of Arduino Uno

Fig. 4: Vehicle mode

drive the motors. Output pins 4 through 7 of Arduino are connected to IN1 through IN4 pins of L293D, respectively. Ground

pins 4, 5, 12 and 13 of L293D are connected to ground pins of the Arduino. The two 100 RPM geared DC motors (M1 and M2) are directly connected to output terminals of the L293D. Mechanical arrangement of the bot or car is completed by attaching two wheels to the two motor shafts. Army directional wheels should be used on the front side of the car for moving towards left or right. (Castor wheel was used as the front wheel during testing at EFY Lab.) The Arduino Uno can be programmed with the Arduino software (IDE). Switch off the Bluetooth module or disconnect it from Arduino while burning the asc_car.ino sketch into the Arduino Uno. Connect smartphone with HC-05 module. After all the connections and mechanical arrangements are complete, download Arduino Bluetooth Controller app from Google Play Store in Android smartphone. There are many similar apps available on Play Store. This project uses ArduinoRC—an Arduino Bluetooth Controller app developed by Estacado’s Ltd. Open the ArduinoRC application in Android smartphone and connect with the HC-05 device by typing ‘1234’ or ‘0000’ as pin for pairing with HC-05. Feeding values in the app.

THE COMPLETE MAGAZINE ON OPEN SOURCE

EFY Note The source code of this project is included in this month’s EFY DVD and is also available for free download at source. efymag.com

Press ‘Proceed’ option to connect your smartphone with the HC-05 module. You will see a screen on your Android phone as shown in Fig. 4. Select ‘Vehicle’ mode, open the menu in the top-right corner and select ‘Set Commands’ option. Set value ‘4’ for ‘Stop’ button in the application. Similarly, feed values 0, 1, 2 and 3 for Gesture_Front, Gesture_Left, Gesture_Right and Gesture_Back, respectively. Connect 12V battery supply to L293D module. Now the bot is ready to be controlled with your smartphone. You can control your bot by tilting the smartphone in different positions. Tilt your phone forward or backward to move the bot in forward or backward direction. Similarly, tilt your phone to the right or left to make the bot take right or left turn, respectively. With a slight tweak in the circuit, you can also use this app to control lights, horns and music systems by tilting the smartphone in different directions. Dr P.S. Manoharan (left) is a professor in electrical and electronics engineering, Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai, and S. Naveen (right) is an electronics hobbyist

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Solar GARDEN LIGHT A. SAMIUDDHIN ost houses have backyard gardens or some open areas. Installing a garden light there provides visibility at night. But there can be problems in its installation since the wiring may hamper movement and disturb plants in the garden. Presented here is the circuit of a solar based light that is bright enough to illuminate a garden while not requiring any wiring to the grid supply and thus lowering the electricity bill.

M

L1 100u CON1 FOR 1.2V Ni−Cd BATTERY

2

BAT

LX

IC1 CL0116

CON2 FOR 1.5V SOLAR CELL

1

SBAT

4

3

GND

GND

Fig. 1: Circuit diagram of solar garden light

Circuit and working Circuit diagram of the solar garden light is shown in Fig. 1. It is built around a solar lamp controller IC CL0116 (IC1), a miniature solar cell, a bright white LED (LED1) and a few other components. This circuit requires only a single Ni-Cd rechargeable battery to light up the white LED for more than ﬁve hours depending upon the amperehour (Ah) capacity of the battery. When sunlight falls on the solar cell during daytime, the solar cell charges the rechargeable battery and turns LED1 ‘off.’ When no light falls on the solar cell during nighttime, the IC draws power from the battery and provides constant current to light up LED1. Since the solar cell acts as a light sensor, there is no need of a photo-transistor or light-dependent resistor for automatic switching of the LED in the dark. Lamp controller. IC CL0116 lamp controller is an application-speciﬁc integrated circuit (ASIC) in which solar charging and LED driving sections are integrated on the chip. It requires only an external inductor to construct a boost power supply with over 90 per cent efﬁciency. It offers the advantages of low power dissipation, low minimum operating voltage and WWW.EFYMAG.COM

LED driver circuit is integrated in the controller IC. The IC operates off 0.8V to 3.0V. The voltage on SBAT pin LED1 WHITE should not go beyond 3.0V. For LED better protection, connect a 2.7V zener diode between SBAT pin and ground to maintain 2.7V if the solar cell voltage goes above 2.7V. Solar cell. A 1.5V, 100mA solar cell is sufﬁcient to charge the battery and light the LED. It can be mono-crystalline or polycrystalline. The nominal current of the solar cell should not be more than 800mA. For better performance, use a solar cell with nominal current below 400mA.

Construction and testing Fig. 2: Actual-size PCB layout of solar garden light

Fig. 3: Components layout for the PCB

PARTS LIST Semiconductors: IC1 LED1 Miscellaneous: CON1, CON2 L1

- CL0116 solar lamp controller - 10mm bright white LED -

2-pin terminal connector 100µH inductor 1.2V, 600mAh Ni-Cd battery 1.5V, 200mA solar cell

automatic dusk-to-dawn switching. IC CL0116 is available in TO-94 package and its overall circuit can be enclosed in a matchbox. There is no need of an external current-limiting resistor for the LED because the

An actual-size PCB layout for the solar garden light is shown in Fig. 2 and its components layout in Fig. 3. Assemble the circuit, together with the LED, on the PCB. Use a wire length of not more than 5cm to connect LED1 to the IC. A readymade inductor can be used for the circuit. For better performance and efﬁciency, use a low equivalent series resistance (ESR) value of inductor for the circuit. The circuit can ﬁt in an old torchlight enclosure with appropriate modiﬁcations. Fix connector CON1 and LED1 on the front, and CON2 at the top of the enclosure to connect the solar cell. EFY notes. 1. Battery capacity of 600mAh to 1000mAh is large enough for this circuit. 2. In place of CL0116, you can use QX5252F, ANA608 or YX8018. A. Samiuddhin is a B.Tech in electrical and electronics engineering with keen interest in LED lighting, power electronics, microcontrollers and Arduino programming

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Simple USB Interface SIGNAL MONITOR PETRE TZV PETROV

to a voltmeter or an oscilloscope to BC547 npn transistors (T3 through resented here is a simple, check voltage signals T5), seven LEDs (LED1 through low-cost USB interface signal In all these cases, the maximal LED7), two USB connectors (CON1 monitoring circuit. It can be USB cable length should be limited and CON2), and a few resistors used to monitor signal activity for as speciﬁed under the USB standard. and capacitors. most of the USB interfaces. Connect one of the two USB conThe circuit ﬁnds following Circuit and working nectors to a computer, and the other applications: to a peripheral with USB interface. 1. It can be connected to a cable Circuit diagram of the USB interLED6 and LED7 show the data bus with USB interface to check data face signal monitor is shown in status. You can also use voltmeters, signals in the wires Fig. 1. It is built around two BC557 oscilloscopes and other test equip2. It can be connected between pnp transistors (T1 and T2), three ment to monitor the USB two USB cables, with the ﬁrst LED OPERATION interface activity. cable connected to a computer Interface status LED Operation table details and the second to a peripheral LED the LEDs’ indication in the device with a USB interface, to LED1 = On Data- = Low level circuit. Voltage drop across all monitor various signals LED2 = On Data+ = Low level the LEDs should be around 3. It can be connected to a LED3 = On Data- = High level 1.6V, and the LEDs should be USB power supply or USB bat- LED4 = On Data+ = High level able to produce light at current tery charger and other devices LED5 = On Data+ and Data- are high at the same time levels as low as 1mA. Resiswith USB interfaces to check LED6 = On The LED is ‘on’ if you have normal power supply tors R1, R2 and R9 through power signals LED7 = On The LED is ‘on’ if you have reverse power supply R11 are used to limit the 4. It can also be connected

P

LED1

R9 100E

LED2 R3 22K D−

R5 22K T3 BC547

T1 BC557 D+ T2 BC557

R4 22K

R11 100E

R6 22K

R13 10E

R14 10E

CON3 FOR MEASURING POWER SUPPLY

R17 10E

T4 BC547

R7 22K

T5 BC547

R8 22K

R2 100E

R1 100E

VCC D− D+ GND

R10 100E

CON1 FOR USB1 Vcc D− D+ GND

LED3

LED4

R16 10E

CON5 FOR VOLTMETER

LED5 R15 10E

GND

R12 1K

J3 CON4 J4 FOR OSCILLOSCOPE

F1 0.5A

C1 10u 16V

C2 100n

C3 100n

LED6 FORWARD

LED7 REVERSE

Vcc D− D+ GND CON2 FOR USB2 PERIPHERAL DEVICE

Fig. 1: Circuit diagram of the simple USB interface signal monitor

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DO-IT-YOURSELF

Fig. 2: Actual-size PCB layout of the USB interface signal monitor

PARTS LIST Semiconductors: T1, T2 - BC557 pnp transistor T3-T5 - BC547 npn transistor LED1-LED7 - 5mm LED Resistors (all 1/4-watt, ±5% carbon): R1, R2, R9-R11 - 100-ohm R3-R8 - 22-kilo-ohm R12 - 1-kilo-ohm R13-R17 - 10-ohm Capacitors: C1 - 10µF, 16V electrolytic C2, C3 - 100nF ceramic disk Miscellaneous: CON1, CON2 - USB connector A type CON3 - 4-pin connector CON4, CON5 - 2-pin connector F1 - 0.5A fuse with holder - USB cable

current ﬂowing through the LEDs. You can increase the resistor values from 100 ohms to 500 ohms as per your requirements. Resistors R3 through R8 are used to limit the base current of transistors T1 through T5 and the load of DATA+ and DATA-. These resistors should have the maximal possible values in order

Fig. 3: Components layout for the PCB

to reduce the USB load. The exact values of these resistors depends on the DC gain of the transistors and the current required for the LEDs. Power supply. The circuit operates in the full power supply range of the USB interface. If polarity of the supply from the USB connector is reversed, LED7 glows. Otherwise, it remains off and LED6 glows during normal (forward) operation. Current measurement. Resistor R17 and connector CON5 are used to measure the current of the interface. For example, if the power supply current is 0.3A, the voltage drop across resistor R17 will be 30mV. Use a digital voltmeter or oscilloscope to measure the voltage drop across R17. Oscilloscope. You can connect the oscilloscope to 4-pin header CON3 or to 2-pin header CON5. Also, you can use connector CON4 to connect an oscilloscope, voltmeter or module operating from +5V supply.

Adjustment. The circuit does not need any special adjustment to operate. However, in some cases, you may need to change the values of some resistors, and use transistors with high DC gain and LEDs with low forward voltage drop, but that’s very rare.

Construction and testing An actual-size PCB layout of the USB interface monitor is shown in Fig. 2 and its components layout in Fig. 3. After assembling the circuit on the PCB, enclose it in a suitable box such that all the connectors are easily accessible. Mount the LEDs (LED1 through LED7) on the front side of the box for visual indication of signals. Petre Tzv Petrov was a researcher and assistant professor in �� Morocco. Now he is working as an electronics engineer in the private sector in Bulgaria

For More �� Visit www.electronicsb2b.com

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. S.C DI IVE W D

Optical SLAVE FLASH TRIGGER T.K. HAREENDRAN n digital cameras, the slave ﬂash is part of an external ﬂashgun (or speedlight) that sits quiet until it sees a bright light. When the slave ﬂash sees a light from another source, it ﬂashes to trigger the speedlight, which gives a more powerful lighting option than a typical built-in ﬂash unit. Use of off-camera ﬂashgun option gives you some great dynamic lighting for wonderful photography that would be difﬁcult otherwise. Here we describe the circuit of a light-sensitive sensor that detects light impulses and wakes up the electronics to ﬁre the attached speedlight. The goal is to make the circuit small, cheap, isolated and independently powered. The circuit uses inexpensive and readily available components. Its main functions are: 1. Sense the light impulse (from

I

the master ﬂash) using a standard light sensor 2. Verify that the light level is above a constant threshold (which can be altered using a potentiometer to tweak the detection sensitivity) 3. Trigger the slave ﬂash through a galvanically-isolated (contact-free) electronic switch The author’s prototype is shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1: Author’s prototype without enclosure

R1 47E

PARTS LIST Semiconductors: IC1 - MOC3021 opto-isolated triac T1 - 5mm round L14F1 phototransistor T2 - BC547 npn transistor Resistors (all 1/4-watt, ±5% carbon): R1 - 47-ohm VR1 - 22-kilo-ohm potmeter Miscellaneous: CON1, CON2 - 1-pin connector BATT.1 - CR2032, 3V coin cell (Li-MnO2)

T1

1

A

MT

K

IC1 NC MOC3021

L14F1 2 3

VR1 22K

NC

5

MT 4

T2 BC547

GND

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THE COMPLETE MAGAZINE ON OPEN SOURCE

6

Circuit and working Fig. 2 shows the circuit of optical ﬂash trigger. It is built around phototransistor L14F1 (T1), optoisolated triac MOC3021 (IC1), npn transistor BC547 (T2) and a few other components. This circuit works on the principle of Wheatstone bridge. When light falls on the phototransistor (T1), its conductivity (and current) increases, which forward biases the driver transistor (T2). As a result, IC1 wakes up to trigger the slave ﬂash; an optical coupling makes it safe to use even the oldest ﬂashgun that could otherwise damage your circuitry by high-voltage ignition. However, note that the connected slave ﬂash doesn’t work in bright daylight or bright ambient light. Likewise, it may even misﬁre when you have a CON1 very bright source of FOR SW1 artiﬁcial light in its path. The potmeter BATT.1 3V (VR1) helps you to set correctly the light detection threshold CON2 level. FOR SW2 The light sensor used here is a generic 5mm round phototransistor L14F1

The latest from the Open Source world is here.

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DO-IT-YOURSELF available in TO-18 package. It is a high-speed and highly sensitive silicon npn phototransistor. The device is matched to visible light and infrared radiation. Optoisolated triac MOC3021 consists of a gallium-arsenide infrared emitting diode, optically coupled to a silicon bilateral switch. Since coin-type CR2032 lithium-manganese dioxide battery has a nominal voltage of 3V (nominal capacity 220mAh), the entire circuit can be powered from it without any difﬁculty.

Fig. 3: Actual-size PCB layout of optical slave ��

Construction and testing

Fig. 5: Hot shoe connection for the circuit

An actual-size PCB layout for optical slave ﬂash trigger is shown in Fig. 3 and its components layout in Fig. 4. After assembling the circuit on the PCB, enclose it in a suitable box. Interconnection. For interconnection between the assembled slave ﬂash trigger circuit and the slave ﬂashgun, a female hot shoe

SW2) of the circuit to the hot shoe’s electrical (trigger) contacts through a built-in/freestanding sync cable as shown in Fig. 5.

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Fig. 4: Components layout for the PCB

is required. All that needs to be done to trigger the ﬂashgun when it is in the hot shoe is to short the two trigger contacts. So just extend the switch output (from SW1 and

T.K. Hareendran is founder and promoter of TechNode Protolabz

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Demo Of 555 Timer-Based ASTABLE MULTIVIBRATOR Using MATLAB SHIBENDU MAHATA AND SAIKAT PATRA n analogue electronics, oscillators and their implementation using integrated circuits (ICs) is an important subject. As 555 timer IC is easy to understand and ﬂexible enough to suit diverse applications, it is used in astable multivibrator (oscillator) conﬁguration for study purpose. While covering the topic in the classroom, instructors often use circuit simulators such as Proteus and TINA to show the output waveform variation of 555 timer IC by changing the resistor or capacitor values. We present here a demo program for a 555 timer-based astable multivibrator, which is implemented using the graphical user interface

I

(GUI) in MATLAB 2014 environment, as shown in Fig. 1. Two resistors and a capacitor are required to operate 555 timer IC in astable mode. When the user enters values of the external components (R1, R2 and C) and presses ‘Run’ button, the simulator provides the time period, frequency and duty cycle of the square wave. The program also shows the output square waveform in the ﬁgure window (Fig. 2). The GUI also shows the circuit diagram for operating timer 555 in astable mode.

Software As mentioned before, 555 timer IC is used in astable mode in order

Fig. 1: The GUI for the 555 timer astable mode simulator

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to produce a square wave. Time period (or frequency) and duty cycle of the astable multivibrator is determined by external components R1, R2 and C (refer to the circuit diagram in Fig. 1). The time during which the output is high: Th=0.693×(R1+R2)×C seconds The time during which the output is low: Tl=0.693×R2×C seconds Therefore the time period of the square wave is: T=Th+Tl=0.693×{R1+(2×R2)}× C seconds and frequency in Hertz (Hz) is: f=1/T=1.44/{R1+(2×R2)}×C

Fig. 2: Waveform for R1=1000 ohms, R2=1000 ohms and C=1000µF

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DO-IT-YOURSELF ing ‘Run’ button, MATLAB executes a callback function to calculate and display the time period, frequency and duty cycle, and plots the waveform. The waveforms for two different sets of component values are shown in Figs 2 and 3, respectively. You can also try out the following by building upon this Fig. 3: Waveform for R1=1000 ohms, R2=1000 ohms and C=1µF work: 1. Plot voltage variation across capacitor C The duty cycle of the square 2. Change the supply voltage waveform=Th/(Th+Tl)×100%= from 5V to 10V and plot the output (Th/T)×100% waveform; you will ﬁnd that the The user must enter the values amplitude of the output varies of R1, R2 and C, and click ‘Run’ in 3. Connect a diode (anode to order to simulate the astable mode pin 7 of IC and cathode to pin 6) in operation of 555 timer IC. On click-

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EFY Note The source code of this project is included in this month’s EFY DVD and is also available for free download at source. efymag.com

parallel with R2 and plot the output waveform; you get a 50% duty-cycle output waveform

Shibendu Mahata is M.Tech (gold medallist) in instrumentation and electronics engineering from Jadavpur University. Currently, he is pursuing Ph.D from NIT, Durgapur. He has keen interest in MCU-based real-time embedded signal processing and process control systems

Saikat Patra is passionate about electronics and MCU-based embedded system applications

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ADVERTISERS’ INDEX Client name

Page No.

Client name

Page No.

Client name

Page No.

A1 Cadtech ............................................................................................132

HK Wentworth (India) Pvt Ltd ................................................................139

Phoenix Mecano .................................................................................... 119

AN Wireless Solutions .............................................................................87

IED Communications Ltd (www.iedcommunications.com) ....................47

Positronic Pvt. Ltd ....................................................................................71

Anant Enterprises (www.indiamart.com) ...............................................130

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AqTronics Technologies Pvt Ltd ..............................................................19

Iota Onair (www.iotaonair.com)..............................................................132

Binay Opto Electronics Pvt Ltd (www.binayLED.com)............................37

Jai Mata Electronics...............................................................................133

BlackT Electrotech .................................................................................132

Jetking Infotrain Ltd..................................................................................35

Rajguru Electronics..................................................................................61

CADD Centre Training Services Private Limited...................................123

Keysight Technologies India Pvt Ltd (www.keysight.com) ........................5

RECOM Asia Pte Ltd ...............................................................................87

Coslight India Telecom Pvt Ltd ..............................................................124

Kits N Spares .........................................................................................121

Redpine......................................................................................................6

Digi-Key Electronics (www.digikey.com)....................................................2

LWI Electronics Inc. (www.livewireinfo.com) ...........................................23

Dinrack Integrated System Pvt Ltd........................................................125

Martin Electronic Devices & Instruments...............................................131

Dow Corning India Private Limited ..........................................................67

Matrix Comsec Pvt. Ltd............................................................................25

Dynalog (India) Ltd (www.dynalogindia.com)............................................9

Max Electronics......................................................................................133

Schurter Electronics (I) Pvt Ltd..............................................................127

E Control Devices ..................................................................................129

Max Technology & Co. (www.maxtechnoloindia.com) ............................39

�� ......................29

EFY Group: Subscripton ...............................................................134, 135

Meco Meters Pvt Ltd (www.mecoinst.com) .................................55, 57, 59

Sealed Energy Systems ..........................................................................49

EFY Group: India Electronics Week 2018.............................................138

Mega Kit .................................................................................................133

Servokon Systems Pvt Ltd ....................................................................124

Elcina-EFY Awards ..................................................................................58

Microchip Technology Hong Kong Ltd. (www.microchip.com)................65

Elcom International Pvt Ltd (www.Deltin.com) ......................................128

Montu Electronics LLP...........................................................................133

Element14 India Pvt Ltd.............................................................................1

Mouser Electronics (India) Private Limited................................................7

Embedded Technology Labs (www.etechlabsindia.com)......................126

MSS Powertech Pvt Ltd.........................................................................132

Stride Technology.....................................................................................49

Epcos AG .................................................................................................89

National Controlling & Equipments........................................................132

Systellar Innovations (www.systellar.in).................................................128

�� .....................................63, 125

NI Systems India Pvt Ltd .........................................................................33

TAITRA ....................................................................................................69

Fusion Power Systems (www.amptek.in)..............................................126

Nikon India Pvt Ltd...................................................................................43

Goodwin Electronics Pvt. Ltd.................................................................132

NMTronics India Pvt Ltd (www.nmtronics.com).......................................13

Green Vision Technologies ........................................................................3

Pasternack .............................................................................................140

Hicotronics Devices Pvt Ltd..................................................................... 11

Perfect Radios........................................................................................132

Virson Corporation .................................................................................133

Hind Electronika India Private Limited (www.hindelec.com)..................31

Persang Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.........................................................52, 53

World Robot Olympiad India 2017...........................................................32

Progressive Engineers ..........................................................................129 PSI Enterprises ......................................................................................126

Rohde & Schwarz (www.rohde-schwarz.co.in) .......................................73 Sakthi Accumulators Private Ltd............................................................132

Shavison Electronics Pvt Ltd (www.shavison.com)...............................103 ST Microelectronics Marketing Pvt. Ltd...................................................75

Toshniwal Sensing Devices Private Limited..........................................129 Universal Electronic Agencies (www.easternradio.co.in)......................128

ADVERTISERS’ PRODUCT CATEGORIES INDEX Products

Page No.

Products

Page No.

Products

Page No.

Products

Page No.

Automation & Robotics

Consumer Electronics & Appliances

Reseller and Distributors

Hind Electronika India Private Limited................ 31

Dynalog (India) Ltd ............................................... 9

Nikon India Pvt. Ltd ............................................ 43

AqTronics Technologies Pvt. Ltd ........................ 19

Keysight Technologies India Pvt. Ltd.................... 5

Digi-Key Electronics ............................................. 2

Meco Meters Pvt Ltd............................... 55, 57, 59

Element14 India Pvt Ltd. ...................................... 1

Rohde & Schwarz............................................... 73

Hicotronics Devices Pvt Ltd.................................11

�� ............................ 29

Persang Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.................... 52, 53 Batteries & Power Supplies Coslight India Telecom Pvt. Ltd. ....................... 124

EDA Tools (Including Designing

Fusion Power Systems..................................... 126

& Drafting Aids)

Green Vision Technologies................................... 3

NI Systems India Pvt Ltd .................................... 33

Martin Electronic Devices & Instruments.......... 131

LWI Electronics Inc. ............................................ 23 Max Electronics (Delhi)..................................... 133

Montu Electronics LLP...................................... 133

Educational Training Kits

Mouser Electronics (India) Private Limited ........... 7

National Controlling & Equipments................... 132

Mega Kit ........................................................... 133

Perfect Radios.................................................. 132

PSI Enterprises................................................. 126 RECOM Asia Pte Ltd.......................................... 87 Sakthi Accumulators Private Ltd....................... 132 Sealed Energy Systems ..................................... 49 Servokon Systems Pvt Ltd ............................... 124 Shavison Electronics Pvt. Ltd........................... 103 Cabinets, Enclosures & Accessories Dinrack Integrated System Pvt Ltd................... 125 Jai Mata Electronics ......................................... 133 Phoenix Mecano................................................119 Universal Electronic Agencies .......................... 128

Rajguru Electronics ............................................ 61 Industrial & Manufacturing Equipment Max Technology & Co......................................... 39 NMTronics India Pvt Ltd ..................................... 13 IT Products A1 Cadtech....................................................... 132 Embedded Technology Labs ............................ 126

Sensors & Transducers Toshniwal Sensing Devices Private Limited ..... 129

Kits N Spares.................................................... 121 Mega Kit ........................................................... 133

Trade Shows and Events Elcina-EFY Awards............................................. 58 IED Communications Ltd.................................... 47 TAITRA ............................................................... 69

Services

World Robot Olympiad India 2017...................... 32

A1 Cadtech....................................................... 132

Materials (Including Chemicals &

BlackT Electrotech............................................ 132

��

Consumables)

Embedded Technology Labs ............................ 126

CADD Centre Training Services

Dow Corning India Private Limited ..................... 67

Private Limited.............................................. 123

HK Wentworth (India) Pvt Ltd ........................... 139

Solar Products

Progressive Engineers ..................................... 129

MSS powertech pvt. ltd..................................... 132

Components (Including Active & Passive) CADD Centre Training Services

Stride Technology ............................................... 49

Tools & Toolkits

Optics & Optoelectronics

Private Limited.............................................. 123

Binay Opto Electronics Pvt Ltd........................... 37

Elcom International Pvt Ltd............................... 128

Systellar Innovations ........................................ 128

Epcos AG............................................................ 89 ��............................................................... 15

PCBs, Assemblies & Sub Assemblies

Microchip Technology Hong Kong Ltd. ............... 65

Goodwin Electronics Pvt Ltd............................. 132

Pasternack........................................................ 140

Virson Corporation............................................ 133

Phoenix Mecano................................................119

Switches & Relays E Control Devices............................................. 129 Telecom Products

Iota Onair.......................................................... 132 Jetking Infotrain Ltd ............................................ 35

Transformers Anant Enterprises............................................. 130 Servokon Systems Pvt Ltd ............................... 124

Matrix Comsec Pvt Ltd ....................................... 25 Wireless Modules/Modem Test & Measurement Equipment (Including

AN Wireless Solutions........................................ 87

Schurter Electronics (I) Pvt Ltd......................... 127

Plugs, Sockets & Connectors

Indicators & Monitors)

BlackT Electrotech............................................ 132

ST Microelectronics Marketing Pvt. Ltd .............. 75

Positronic Pvt. Ltd............................................... 71

FLIR Systems India Pvt. Ltd....................... 63, 125

Redpine ................................................................ 6

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EFY Magazine Attractions During 2017 MONTH

TECHNOLOGY FOCUS

ELECTRONICS DESIGN

MARKET SURVEYS

January

Computer Vision

Lowering Power Consumption

Electronic Component Manufacturing

February

Smart Fabrics

Improving Wireless Signal Performance

Electronics Manufacturing Services

March

Exciting Technologies Powering the IoT

Building More Reliable Printed Circuit Boards

Industry Outlook for 2017-18

April

Virtual and Augmented Reality

Developer Boards: DIY and Hobbyist Applications

Printed Circuit Boards

May

Smart Robotics

Fight of the Processors: Ultra-Low-Voltage Computing The Internet of Things (Mobile and Portable Devices)

June

Artificial Intelligence

How to Get the Best Design for Manufacturing

Strategic Electronics

July

5G and Beyond

Developer Boards: Industrial Applications

Mobile Handset and Telecom Device Manufacturing

August

3D Printing

Improving Thermal Dissipation

LED Lighting

September Industrial IoT

Which Input Technologies Should You Use

Solar

October

The Brains of Mobile Devices

Ruggedising Hardware

Electronics Manufacturing Equipment (Both SMT and Non-SMT Categories)

November

Security of the IoT

Fight of the Processors: High-Performance Computing Test and Measurement

December

Implantable and Edible Electronics

Which Output Technologies Should You Use

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Materials and Chemicals

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