Generally the x um or y nm of a process refers to transistor dimensions (typically gate length), not metal. Minimum metal pitch is still a key dimension for the ability to build useful structures though, so advances like these are very useful.
No, the gate length on most 5nm nodes is like 40nm or something. Since around 2008-ish, the “process name” and the size of any feature have rapidly diverged (even if you use some weird pointless metric like the size of a FinFET fin, nothing on 5nm measures 5nm).
Ironically, prior to 2008 the process name was backwards the other way, for example 130nm process usually has something like 70nm gates.
It’s always really just been a marketing thing anyway, since the possible density of a given logic unit in a given manufacturers process will differ due to a huge number of factors.
Just to reiterate: in old-skool HS electricity terms, a transistor is going to need enough electrons. That number is pretty large, and is tied pretty strongly to materials and geometry. Those two things (materials & geometry) change far slower than Moore's law. What changes quickly is gate density and design cleverness.
If a battery is internally a set of connected cells, then as a battery designer you have the choice of wiring the cells in series or parallel. Need more voltage: series. Need more mAh: parallel. Cell 'quality' is a vague term since some applications may care more about discharge rates or operating temperature range than total capacity.
Usually though, batteries are designed with a particular application in mind and that application will define a voltage that is acceptable, such as ~3.8V for phones or ~19V for laptops. Significantly above this would damage the device. Likewise, below that voltage and the device doesn't function. This is why mAh is a decent proxy for Wh; for a given application the voltage is fixed and so the conversion - for that application - is fixed. mAh for a given application can be compared easily.
Comparing batteries for different applications is harder, but not just because you have to convert mAh to Wh: different applications require different performance characteristics beyond just voltage. You might care about weight, physical dimensions, operating temperatures, discharge rates, charge rates, self-discharge rates, output impedance.
We use a Roku with an LG OLED, mostly to avoid connecting the TV to the internet. Turns out if you use the HDMI ARC for audio (we connected to a soundbar) and everything in the chain is new enough, then the Roku remote volume buttons will adjust the soundbar volume just fine. Roku remote can also turn the TV on and off, so we don't need the LG remote now except to change to a different input.
You're right that the collector and emitter are not identical in size nor geometry nor surface area bordering the base. There's a nice cross-section about three-quarters of the way down this page[1] that shows the basic layout for a BJT. As to why we fabricate them as nested wells instead of side-by-side rectangles, I believe it is to maximize junction area relative to die area. These layers are exceedingly thin, so almost all of the junction is top-to-bottom, not side-to-side.
In case you weren't aware, the US also pursued nuclear powered airplanes[1] with actual test units built. They're still sitting out there in Idaho a few miles off the highway and you can visit certain times of the year. Reading the placards (or the wiki) honestly scares me a bit, despite my thought that nuclear power makes a lot of sense for our energy needs. I don't love the idea of 500mph reactors up above me, even with modern airplane safety records.
I think it has more to do with design rules for metal layers. Between the rules for: min area, max area, min density, max density, and density gradient it can be tough to get artwork to be manufacturable, even if you have the space for it. No one wants to risk poor yields because of the art.
As others have noted, the IRS doesn't know everything, and some things may be to your advantage to report to them. They could send you a bill and ask you to fix it, but many people wouldn't know where to look to find mistakes.
For example: RSUs and NQSOs (employee stock grants) are in my experience handled extremely poorly by default. If I have RSUs vest when the stock is worth $10 a share, then I pay income tax that year based on income of ($10 x share-count). If I sell those shares later on, my brokerage reports to the IRS either: unknown basis value or $0 basis value. The correct basis value is $10 per share. There's a spot in the tax forms where you can tell the IRS that you have the corrected basis, but if you don't do this, you will pay extra tax, and it's an easy one to miss, especially if you're just importing the 1099-B.
At tax time my brokerage does send me additional forms beyond the 1099-B that include the corrected basis values, so its not that they don't know the right value, they just don't give it to the IRS directly. I assume this is due to IRS/congress rules and not my brokerage being obnoxious.
> As others have noted, the IRS doesn't know everything, and some things may be to your advantage to report to them.
Sure, and I'd be ok with giving people the option to deny the default return and file their own using Intuit or something. For people like me, who don't have the ambition to try and do anything clever with taxes, I'd be ok with the default return that they generate from all the information sent via my employer and banks.
> They could send you a bill and ask you to fix it, but many people wouldn't know where to look to find mistakes.
Then people in that situation can do it from scratch like they're already required to do now. This is really not an issue anywhere else - this change wouldn't make the process harder for anyone.
I also have to deal with the cost basis issue every year, and it’s the biggest headache in the entire process for me and my partner. I don’t understand why the brokerage can’t provide the correct basis directly — it would lead to way fewer mistakes and more accurate returns.
> They could send you a bill and ask you to fix it, but many people wouldn't know where to look to find mistakes.
The overwhelming majority of people do not have complicated taxes. That is the exception and as others have pointed out, they could hire an accountant just like they do today.
Having the IRS mail out your bill would eliminate the need for most people to purchase accounting software each year, which is exactly what Intuit doesn't want.
To elaborate on the GP comment, the issue is not whether the brokerage reports, but how they do it. You generally compute capital gain income as (sale price) - (acquisition price). If you buy a stock on the market and sell it, brokers generally report both sale price and acquisition price to you and the IRS.
But for employee stock compensation, the broker can report sale price without acquisition price to the IRS. If you don't report the acquisition price yourself, the IRS will think that it's 0, and assume your income is much higher than the real value.
How does this work with sites that have absurdly strict password requirements? i.e. 8-16 characters, 3+ letters (1+ of which is upper case), 2+ numbers, 1+ special characters (from their curated list only!) I've seen a few financial related sites have requirements like these, and with a typical password generator I can just click 'generate' until one pops out that meets the reqs, and save it.
For those sites, I usually just add whatever characters are needed to satisfy the requirements to the generated password (e.g., 0). This is annoying, since I have to keep track of which sites required such amendments. Fortunately, the majority of websites I use don't have such annoying requirements. And if I ever forget which sites have "amended" passwords, it's easy to find out simply by attempting to log in and being denied entry (in other words, I can brute force my way in).
Despite this awkwardness, I think this approach is worth it. I only have to memorize one password, and yet I still have a different password for every website. And if the Chrome extension ever gets shut down (*), the algorithm is simple enough to recreate in 4 lines of Python:
bits = (domain + '/' + universal_password).encode()
for i in range(2 ** 16):
bits = hashlib.sha256(bits).digest()
generated_password = base64.b64encode(bits).decode()[:16]
(*) I am the author of that Chrome extension, so I personally am not worried about it being shut down. But it is perfectly valid for other people to have that concern, of course.
It's a good idea that I've considered. However, I didn't anticipate the need for this when I originally designed Hashpass in 2014, and adding it now would be a breaking change.
I'm still considering it, but there would need to be a very slow, very careful rollout plan. Probably some transition period where users can opt into the new scheme, then eventually make the new scheme the default but still support the old scheme, and finally remove the old scheme to make things simple again.
Since this is a Chrome extension which collects no information from users, I have no way of contacting users about this. So I would need to wait long enough that users discover it themselves in the UI. All told, I'd guess it would take about a year for the full migration.
Yes, a checkbox is one way to allow users engage with this feature. There are other changes I'm considering as well (e.g., increasing the length of the generated passwords, avoiding characters that look like other characters such as 0 and O, etc.). You have the right idea, but the new experience needs to be designed holistically.
Some luxury brands intentionally limit production of popular items and only sell them to their best customers. Since everyone wants the limited things, they buy lots of the lower tier, unlimited stuff to become a VIP customer and get offered a slot to buy a limited item. Ferrari is famous for limiting sales of their highest end cars to certain clients. High end hand bag producers limit sales of their most popular models to approved clients only. High end watches are similar as well.
If you can't afford all the extra stuff you had to buy along the way, you can try to resell it and get some of the cash back. If you need more cash, you can resell the limited availability items as well, often for a significant profit over the MSRP, even after the middleman's cut.
Fashionphile, The Real Real, Ann's Fabulous Finds, Yugi's Closet are all active companies in this space.
