AM signals: goodbye to CFLs and analog frame grabbers, but waterfall hangs on
GE will stop manufacturing compact fluorescent lamps for the U.S. market this year to focus its consumer-lighting efforts on LEDs. “The reason GE can make the shift from CFLs to LEDs today is because LED prices have dramatically declined since GE engineer Nick Holonyak invented the first red-light LED in 1962,” writes Mark Egan at GE Reports, with a 60-W equivalent LED costing $3.33 at Sam’s Club. “LEDs now account for 15% of the 1.7 billion bulbs sold annually in the United States,” writes Egan. “GE expects that by 2020, LEDs will be used in more than 50% of U.S. light sockets.”
The Waterfall method of software development (with discrete steps for requirements determination, design, implementation, verification, and maintenance) was introduced in 1956 and is still in use, according to Kevin C. Desouza and Gregory S. Dawson at the Brookings TechTank blog. “In was only in 1994 that the Department of Defense, under MIL-STD-498, began to express a ‘preference’ for alternative methodologies,” they write. “However, as recently as 2013, in the failed launch of healthcare.gov, major parts of the waterfall methodology were still being used and one of its key tenets (holding testing until the end) was a primary reason cited for its failure.” Over the next 10 weeks, TechTank will look at technology practices that are stifling public sector success and need to be retired.
BitFlow Inc. yesterday announced it will discontinue production of its Alta-AN1 and Alta-AN4 analog frame grabbers. The company will focus on digital CoaXPress, Camera Link, and differential digital frame grabbers designed for machine-vision and medical-imaging applications. “While BitFlow has a reputation in the industry of product longevity, sometimes it becomes a necessity to end-of-life older product families,” said Donal Waide, director of sales and marketing for BitFlow. “We are excited to empower vision professionals with our new digital frame grabbers to improve their designs, transform quality control systems, and bring innovative solutions to market more cost-effectively.”
