Application Notes and Others

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What is an application note?

An application note is essentially a document a (typically semiconductor) company puts out in order to demonstrate the capabilities of their hardware by giving examples of how to use their components.

However, not all of them are for marketing purposes. Some of them contain general engineering principles and insights you'd learn only after years of industry experience. These types of notes are often the most valuable due to the broadness of their application.

Quality varies substantially from company to company and depends heavily on the author. Appeal to authority is very real here, so much so that there are extremely famous AN authors such as the late Jim Williams who wrote troves of extremely valuable documents throughout his entire career.

Besides these, this page also has whitepapers, presentations, websites, and different research papers that are of interest.

Tektronix. XYZs of Oscilloscopes

here

Goes over different types of oscilloscopes and how they work. Very insightful look at one of the most important instruments in our discipline

Texas Instruments AN-31. Amplifier circuit collection

here

Has a plethora of example op amp circuits. Don't expect to learn the "how" of the circuits though

Texas Instruments. Op Amps For Everyone

here

Much less of a "note" and more of an e-book. Goes over pretty much everything you need to know about op amps. I find this more approachable than a dedicated electronics book

Analog Devices AN-202. Decoupling, Grounding, and Making Things Go Right

here

The title is much longer, but it is very descriptive in regards to the subject matter. This is very useful for the realization of circuits and is something they seldom teach in school. At least for me :(

Texas Instruments. Handbook of Operational Amplifier Applications

here

More about op amps from TI. Seems to be a theme at that company. I must admit, I did not spend long reading through this "report" as they call it. No matter the fact, its still a good resource from what I can gather at a glance

Microsemi. PIN Diode Circuit Designers' handbook

here

Title says it all, very useful for RF design engineers

Motorola. RF Device Data Volume 1

here

While at a glance this may seem like one gigantic datasheet, the real gems lie in the test circuit figures

Signetics. Write-Only Memory

here

This offers no academic or professional value. This is just really funny

Linear Technology AN-47. High Speed Amplifier Techniques

here

Superb. If this topic interests you, read it

Agilent AN-154. S-Parameter Design

here

Goes through S parameters all the way to broadband LNA design. Very impressive in only 44 pages. Is this a testament to the author's knowledge or textbook author's long-windedness?

Hewlett Packard AN-95-1. S-Parameter Techniques

here

From what I garnered, it has the same material as above but in presentation format. More digestible for those of us with shorter attention spans, such as myself

Same as above

here

This is exactly the same as AN-95-1. However it is in a report format rather than presentation

Texas Instruments AN-058. Antenna Selection Guide

here

Gives a small briefing on basic antenna theory for the first half. The second half is a bunch of reference designs. I like replicating the designs in a tool like openEMS

Cypress AN-91445. Antenna Design and RF Layout Guidelines

here

Excellent design resource for actually integrating an antenna into a system

More to come