Welcome

Welcome to my ever-evolving blog. It started out as a blog on Beachbody workouts and products, mainly when I was a Beachbody coach. I no longer coach, not because I don't believe in Beachbody's programs (I subscribe to Beachbody on Demand and use their workouts every day), I am just not a salesperson and hated that aspect of it. I am more than willing to answer questions about my experiences with their products and the various workouts, and I feel freer to do so without the appearance of giving a biased review of something.

I have also started adding reviews for various things I have purchased like movies, books, CDs, and other products. This was brought about by a fight with Amazon in which all of my reviews were removed over a completely bullshit allegation that I posted a review that violated their terms of service. After going back and forth with the morons in the community-reviews department (even after they admitted that my posts did not violate their guidelines) they restored my account (which took them six months to do), but I have been posting my reviews on my blog to have them preserved in case something like that happens again. And here, I will post uncensored reviews so I will swear from time to time and post reviews that may be longer than Amazon's character limit. Everything I post here on any topic or product is my personal opinion, and I take no compensation for any product reviews I post. I am a member of Amazon's vine program and because I get those products for free, I keep those reviews on Amazon only, but everything I have purchased with my own money, whether from Amazon or some other store/website/outlet, I will post here.  

I also plan to do some longer blog posts on various topics, such as how to learn physics, how to get through calculus, and longer reviews of workout programs as I do them. Basically, whatever strikes me as interesting at the time.  As you can see if you navigate around the blog, I had many years in between postings. During that time I was going back to school to get an engineering degree, and learning material that I avoided my first time through college was a different experience and one that gave me a lot of insight into how to do well in those classes, which I will try to impart here for those who are looking to get a science or engineering degree. 

Sunday, November 27, 2022

Textbook Review: Fundamentals of Electric Drives

 


This was the book required for my undergraduate electric drives class in my school's electrical engineering curriculum. This book is a bit of a double-edged sword. On one hand, according to my professor, it is pretty much the only textbook on electric drives that is suitable for an undergraduate-level class, as other textbooks get into detail that is appropriate for graduate-level classes. On the other hand, it has a lot of errors, most of which would be impossible to discover unless someone who knows the material tells you about them, such as errors in the equations. The book has a ton of equations, with little explanation beyond just a couple of examples in the chapter text of what they are useful for and how to apply them. The one plus is that the problem sets at the end of the chapter are short, but trying to figure out how to solve them with the instruction from the chapter text is not the easiest thing in the world. Unfortunately, the author of the book has passed away, so unless another professor takes up the mantle of updating the book and putting out a new edition, then this is the only edition that is going to be released, with flaws and all. So ultimately, if you are looking to teach yourself the material in the book, I would definitely look for a study guide so you can double check the material in the book, and if you have to use it for class, be prepared to ask a lot of questions.

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