Re: Steppr motor pulse problem Phillip and others,

To this excellent exposition I would change only one thing:

FThompson9@aol.com wrote:
> Write this pattern down neatly on a sheet of paper that you can
> find again.

Change this to :

"Write this pattern down neatly IN YOUR ROBOTICS NOTEBOOK."

One of my professors at school noted that the most important thing he
learned in graduate school was that "Real scientists keep notes,
FOREVER." 

And this is a very valuable thing. Get a bound lab notebook (I prefer
ones with graph paper, they are not too expensive) and, starting on
about page 5, whenever you sit down to do robotics open it up to the
next blank page. Date the page (and if your patent conscious sign it).
Then as you note things, write them in your notebook. If you write down
something you think you will need to refer back to later, go back to the
front of the notebook (remember you're starting on page 5) and write the
date and a brief synopsis, like "8/28/98 - Stepper motor sequence." When
you're done for the day/evening/weekend/etc, take 5 minutes to write
down what you did, what you learned, what you were curious about or
couldn't figure out, and what would be a good next step.

Make this mode of operation a _habit_. 

Now after you've done this for a while (at least a weeks worth of
entries) you can start using your lab notebook as a resource in three
ways:
	1) Need some information - look in the table of contents
	2) Wondering where you left off last night? Look at the last
	   entry you made.
	3) Have time to do something but don't know what to do? Go
	   back and read a few of the things you were curious about
	   during previous sessions.

Of course you won't know how useful this is until you try it, and at $5
for a nice lab notebook, its a cheap experiment.

--Chuck
P.S. Don't both using a 3-ring binder. You'll just lose pages. If you
want to add something to your notebook like a datasheet or something
just staple it to the page and note it.

