In my case, I’m now a gentleman-forester, gentleman-farmer, and (when the situation calls for it) a standup philosopher (yes, I enjoy misquoting NSFW movies). Retired high school science teacher (thank YOU for paying your taxes [I did my best to work for them in the Ontario school boards]).
And now, I’m re-inventing myself. Sure, I have a teacher’s pension (whew). Woodworking? DIY electronics repair? Possibly do some supply teaching in the Fall (if I need disposible income for my expensive hobbies).
Tinker. Tweaker. Modifyer. That is I.
@@@@@@ Lion’s Head, Ontario and Gilles Lake, ON @@@@@@@@@
Hi @gsrokmix ,
Sorry for the slow reply; I’ve been tied up on projects for a while. Funnily enough I know a lot more about it than I’d have typically expected to, but also not enough to do more than explain how and why it is “a thing” at all.
In my consultancy role, one of my clients is a firm known as “STAC Research” (The Securities Technology Analysis Center). STAC is primarily a vendor-agnostic benchmarking company. They work with a broad range of financial firms (from exchanges and banks to the more agile and innovative hedge funds) and the many technology vendors that supply them; STAC provides benchmarking solutions that allow customers to realistically compare different products or sets of products when there’s so much smoke, mirrors and snake oil about. You’ll see why I mention STAC in a moment.
There are several different firms that have been more than experimenting with it, to the point where it is now shedding its cloak of secrecy (maintained by the early investors to protect their short-term advantage) and being proposed as a commercial offering.
Various radio frequency technologies are used, and firms are always looking for a new “edge” over their competitors. High-frequency trading (HFT) is (as a rule) highly latency-sensitive, and the firms living on the bleeding edge of that particular tech arms race have deep pockets; they are also fiercely protective of their innovation because it is both very expensive and shortlived so they need to capitalise on it while they can.
In about 2011, I was approached by a company called Hibernia, which was trying to raise investment for a new, more direct, undersea cable between mainland Europe and the US. While I, as a technologist, was interested, my firm was not interested in investing at the time. Hibernia, however went on to lay that line and, for several years it was used almost exclusively by financial markets companies. It remains the fastest cross-atlantic fibre link, but it is my understanding that it now gets used more widely than just the financial markets and while long haul such as trans-Atlantic remains largely the domain of subsea cables, the radio waves are getting used for shorter distances.
Microwave transmissions were the first of the radio-based revivals, leveraging antennae across the US and Western Europe, firms could send small payloads of (unreliable) data at extremely close to speed of light in a vacuum (C). Throughout the 2010s, we saw microwave data relays from Chicago to New Jersey and, in Europe, from the outskirts of London to Frankfurt. As with most of these projects, they are initially funded by HFT firms and that often happens with an exclusivity clause that means they get to use the technology for a defined period. A firm that is very experienced in this space is “Mckay brothers” who maintain and operate large-scale microwave networks, and as these are non-exclusive “equal access” products they are available to any that can justify the investment.
Towards the end of the last decade, people started to notice activity related to shortwave radio masts. You’ll see now, why I mentioned STAC, as Bob, the author, spoke about his research into this at one of the STAC events in 2018. Independently, I have personally had the pleasure of working with “Bob”, Bob Van Valzah, in the past. He was a very smart engineer working for a Chicago-based tech firm that developed messaging software that my firm used. That, however, is the limit of my “involvement” in shortwave, so most of what I say is through experience and knowledge of the market, rather than actual concrete fact.
So why do they care? With Hibernia as the fastest route across the Atlantic, and I think demonstrably unbeatable in terms of the shortest path. People will look for other options. The speed of light through glass (fibre optic) is about 60% the speed of light (180,000-200,000 km/s), and by the time you factor in repeaters and so forth, it’s closer to 100,000 km/s. Thus, data travelling from NY to London is going to take about 60ms. Shortwave radio can could reduce that to more like 20ms, and when 10s of 1000s of trades are happening every second, that can make a lot of difference to the quality of the information that you have. Of course, the spectrum is limited, the bandwidth tiny (compared to say fibre), and of course, it is comparatively unreliable (as people here are going to be very aware), being prone to dropouts and interference. As such, you have to be very clever about using it. There are a handful of companies in the HFT space that have both the engineering brainpower and the financial resources to embark on such plans, and, of course, they are generally competing with one another.
I had seen some service offerings in 2022 touting a “commercial equal access” SW service for trading firms. McKay Brothers may have been the provider, but their website does not list it. It was meant to go live last summer, if I recall correctly. What that means, I suspect, is that the initial investors that used this from 2018 have made a return on their initial investment, the exclusivity clause has ended and as such, the network providers can explore the commercial offerings.
For Radio users, this could be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, having companies pay to maintain the SW radio network infrastructure should (I imagine, though it is not an area I am experienced in) be a welcome thing. The flip side is that demand for frequencies in that part of the spectrum, and high-value commercial interest could squeeze previously protected frequencies.
There are other technologies in this space that I expect to see people looking at. The most obvious is the new era of satellite communication networks such as Starlink. Fibre is great until it gets cut, but it is expensive to maintain and does not reach many places in the world. High-speed satellite comms will open up those communities to new capabilities, and among those will be trading.
A less obvious and far more challenging one is hollow-core fibre. This has a speed advantage over solid fibre, but I don’t think it has ever been used over long distances. There are a lot of barriers to overcome there; consider, for example, an undersea cable that gets cut and the hollow core floods… a solvable problem but difficult.
Hello @zyxt,
I had to chuckle a bit when I read your background. As a software guy, I worked for Merrill Lynch about ten years, before they got a black eye being bought out by BoA. Back then, I was involved some in the brokers’ trade platforms. We had many water-cooler discussions about why and how the brokerage houses were trying to locate their compute centers as physically close to the exchanges’ data centers as possible just to shave off a few milliseconds and gain a few extra pennies. Yep, pennies matter when the trade volumes are millions of shares – often millions of shares per minute. Most people are astounded when they learn how much money flows through those pipes every day. The NYSE and NASDAQ trade tens to hundreds of billions worth of instruments daily.
For me, those milliseconds also matter as I’m still a day trader. I like to say “I’m gainfully retired” 🙂 How fast trades place depends noticeably on the size and age of the brokerage firm, which reflects their underlying infrastructure. I noticed a substantial increase in my own profitability when I upgraded my internet connection from aDSL running about 100 MB / sec download (and only ~15 MB up 🙁 ) to a 1 GB fiber connection. And that’s 1GB up too, which is really what seemed to matter.
The idea of a radio modem connection, for me anyway, just seems quirky and probably would turn my books from black to red. LOL
– HP
Hi everyone. I got interested in electronics and ham radio at a young age when one of my uncles was a radio TV repairman and my Dad’s friend was K5GCK. My call is WB5WZM previously WN5ELQ. I obtained my first class FCC license and worked for KMAC & KISS in San Antonio. Then went into servicing mobile communications for Tex Kennedy N5TX. I became a volunteer EMT and from that, interested in servicing medical equipment and worked as a Biomedical Equipment Technician and from there moved over to working in television at Brooks AFB. After Brooks I started servicing diagnostic ultrasound and next was television studio maintenance for Austin Cablevision. I moved to California and went to work as a biomedical technician again and from there started servicing medical imaging equipment for Agfa Healthcare. I serviced daylight film processors, computed radiography, PACS Picture Archiving and Communication Systems, digital radiography and cardio PACS. I retired after all that and enjoying retirement.
Being interested in electronics since my 10´s, I started my professional career as TV repair technician.
When I got the chance for a job in the industry, I switched over to electronics development in the automotive business.
I regularly participate in Repair Cafes where all kinds of electric and electronic devices are brought back to life (at least we try to).
My home electronics workshop is occupying the better part of the basement, to my wife’s regret.
I am also member in the eevblog forum (and Fingers elektrische Welt, for the German enthusiasts)
Greetings all!
I’ve been an enthusiast on any electrical or mechanical all my life – guess I was born with what Dilbert would call “the knack.” Ended up going mechanical engineering in school, as I could immediately start the ME curriculum versus waiting a semester to start the EE flow. Am a ham radio operator (KD5BYB), and pretty much love anything old – old radios, old engines, old cars, old test equipment…you name it…if it’s old, I like it. Greatly enjoy repairing broken stuff and “cheating the junk man” as my old radios friends used to say.
Even though I’m an ME, I’ve done far more EE work in my career. Most of the work has been in test systems and equipment…but mostly do team management / program management now…but from time to time…I’m still able to get my hands-on fix at the office.
thanks much and 73,
Ben, kd5byb
Hello everyone! hope I’m not too late to the party…
I don’t have much of a background in general, still a bit young for that! (23 last week). I’ve always been musician since I can remember, and played classic piano seriously up until I was 17. Once I got sick of it I discovered mixing and audio engineering and I am now working in a professional studio! Interesting thing is I’ve been trying to learn electronics for the past 4-5 years, and part of the reason why I landed the job was because I was able to repair a couple of instruments. My boss was gracious enough to lend me a couple of rooms and I am now building (trying mostly) a lab of my own, since he recently acquired a lot of vintage (and very broken fortunately/unfortunately) instruments and audio gear!
I’m also in to mechanics: i’ve restored a Fiat 616 N1 and I am currently restoring my daily driver (1984 mexi beetle) and maybe a 356 (if the owner decides to sell it lol)
hope you all have a wonderful day,
Alessandro Hull
Arezzo, Tuscany, Italy
~analog all the way~
@alessandro-hull Welcome. Glad to have many different experience levels.
I forgot to mention i hold a general ham license N9SQS.
As a kid, I liked collecting old radios (1940’s vintage). Joined the navy after high school and went to ET (Electronics Technician) school in Great Lakes and then went to BUD/S (Basic UDT/SEAL Training) in Littlecreek VA. Spent 9 years active duty and 20 years reserve as a Navy SEAL. Went to UF and got an EE degree. Currently work civil service in Panama City FL as development engineer and navy diver. I’m a diver test pilot for the navy’s SDV (SEAL Delivery Vehicle). The SDV is a diver operated manned submersible. My hobby is restoring old radios.
@gsrokmix Funny you should ask that question about trading. I worked as an Investment Banker back in 1987 and sat right across from the Wolf of Wall street, Jordan Belfort. Yes that guy they made a movie about with Leonardo Dicaprio. I had to go to a special school and take one of the most grueling tests to pass the exam to get my SEC license, a 6 hour test. What I learned back then was that the big guys on Wall Street known as the Gorillas like Goldman Sacs were already using computers to high speed trade known as front running trades to scalp money form traders. After a year of trying to be a broker and what I saw going on I could not justify staying in an industry that was one of the most corrupt industries on the planet and the SEC is not what they are supposed to be. They constantly look the other way and just let that shit go on even today. I know because I still have the paperwork as proof.
One thing that is a constant when there is big money involved there is big crimes being committed.
Sorry it took me so long to address this posting but here it goes.
Like Larry I too grew up on a farm where one had to be jack of all trades. But to start at the beginning I guess I was born a natural scientist. My mother told me before I learned to walk I would crawl into the gardens and dig in the dirt and smell the flowers. As long as I can remember I have always had an interest in learning about Nature and the Universe which lead me to study science and biology. I took a break from school after High school and went into the NAVY for 2 years where I got training in mechanical engineering. After I got out I work in several areas where I could make a living. Automotive tech, industrial tech working in plastic factories, tried my hand at being a broker at an investment banking firm in 1987 and even worked at SEARS and Roebuck in the electronics department from 1990 to 1995. That is where I got my interest in electronics. In 1996 I went back to college for 7.5 years. studying science, biology, physics, math and philosophy. I eventually ended up with a double Bachelors in chemistry and biology with a Masters in science of teaching. I even got new york state board certified to teach both subjects but never worked as a teacher just subbing for two years. All the while I remained a die hard naturalist working at studying nature, animals and even worked in a lab for two years where I created a new drug to cure anaphylactic shock and presented my work at a National conference where I got published in a Journal. That drug got shelved as drug companies did not want cures they want treatments.
I spent many years over my life time traveling around several countries where I conducted studies and even wrote a few papers on coastal reefs, water ways, lakes, rivers and streams. I specialized in studying animals as that is what I spent most of my youth doing on the farm where we had 235 acres bordering thousands of acres of state land with a river that ran through our farm. It was dream land for me. I spent almost as much time in the woods, fields, rivers, lakes and the mountains of the Adirondacks as I did doing anything else. Animals are amazing if you just take the time to observe them in their natural surroundings. I once saw a deer run into a small patch of brush out in the middle of a field. With no where to go I ran up to that patch of brush expecting to see the deer run away but when I got there it was gone. All I saw was a rabbit hole and concluded it must have gone down that hole. But what it really did was belly crawl away from me keeping that pile of brush between me and it and I never saw it get away.
From 2007 to 2011 I worked at the local casino then retired in summer of 2011. I traveled around the globe for the next 9 years conducting studies. After which I decided to settle down with a hobby, so I took up electronics after seeing one of Mr. Carlson’s youtube videos in 2020. Since than I built a lab in my basement that I now have invested over $35,000 in equipment and supplies. I been fixing my own stuff and now have several relatives and friends that I do electronic repairs for. I am still a novice but am learning as I go. It has been an interesting journey.
Last I would like to recommend a book I just finished that is about the evolution of electricity and how it has changed our lives both good and bad ways. The book is called “The Invisible Rainbow by Arthur Firstenburg”. You will not believe how much about the history electricity we were never told in school. It was a fascinating and interesting read.
Retired TV engineer, Radio Amateur, Built my first radio at 9 Years old with my dear Grandfather, who was a navy signal/ radio operator tech in the Royal Navy, also taught me Morse Code (CW) I have managed to make it to 70 years old, I still repair audio and TV’s for my local community in the village, I’ve live in for the last 40 Years, can’t see any reason to move somwhere else.
@larry_n7luf Was just revisiting this thread – Did you see that Microsoft has open-sourced Zork?
Jim Korman