ChipHit.com Blog

Added Web 2.0 Search and News

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2009-03-29T14:34:31-04:00

We have updated ChipHit to use some web 2.0 (aka ajax) technologies. The traditional search is still available here. If you have added the ChipHit search engine to your browser, please delete it and re-add it so that searches from your browser work properly.

On a separate front, we have added a news tracker showing today’s headlines from across the most popular electrical engineering sites.

Removal of Discussions

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-09-26T20:49:41-04:00

We have terminated ChipHit discussions due to lack of use. There are many other discussion resources covering ASIC/FPGA topics, which we encourage everyone to investigate. In the meantime, we are continuing to investigate adding some additional content. Let us know what you think on the feedback pages.

ChipHit Makeover

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-07-28T18:17:05-04:00

We have undergone a minor makeover to make ChipHit a bit easier and faster to use. On our main search page, we have eliminated some of the graphics and fluff on the front page to improve load times and to make ChipHit easier to use.

As for new additions, ChipHit has now added a privacy policy and a help area, explaining all the features of how to best use the ChipHit's Google Co-op search engine.

Two Month Anniversary

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-07-15T17:27:23-04:00

Our two month anniversary recently past, and we are still going strong. This month we averaged over 1200 unique visits to the site...a bit better than last month. Our advertising efforts are beginning to pay off, as our page strength is also growing. We will keep on self-promoting, and we, of course, ask that you continue to spread the word about ChipHit if you like it. Best thing we can ask is to have more site link to us. We are slowly, but surely, beginning to see that happen.

We are also considering a re-design of ChipHit to become a web-portal. While the search engine would still be the prime feature, we are also considering some other features of the site that could make find information and understanding engineering related products easier. Keep your eyes open....once we have a beta site, we will post that information on how to access the site.

Thanks to those who are using us...you are the reason why we are successful.

Updates to the ChipHit Website

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-06-28T21:51:31-04:00

ChipHit has gone dynamic! We now use dynamic CSS and a few javascript tricks to enable the entire site to dynamically resize. On ChipHit's homepage, you can see a pretty big difference...its almost like Google's homepage now. I had to work a bit to get this to work as the Google Co-op custom search engine would like to lock you into a particular size, however I managed to workaround that. Of course, please send feedback if you like it or hate it. It is not too hard to change back.

I have also spent some time adding more content to the engine, specifically content from the .gov domain. There is a wealth of info out there, its just finding it and having ChipHit get to it without ruining the focus of the search engine. With the most recent changes, we are now up to indexing 763 domains or sub-domains. If you would like a particular site added, please let us know.

One Month Anniversary

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-06-13T02:04:40-04:00

It has been one whole month since chiphit launched and no SNAFUs so far. Here are some stats for fun:

Since I know nothing about web traffic, I will say that I am doing pretty good for month number one by getting 644 unique visitors. Most of the traffic is coming from the US, but the far east is catching up! The bump in traffic is due to PLD DesignLines' mention of ChipHit. If you enjoy ChipHit, tell your friends and have them link to our site. Here is to another good month!

Added Verification Refinement

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-06-05T00:36:10-04:00

Recently added a verification refinement to search for verification topics. This search is a bit more specific than language refinement in the sense that it searches sites that are soley dedicated to verification issues.

"Under the Hood" Redesign of ChipHit

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-28T17:50:36-04:00

I discovered that I was designing "old school" on the front page of ChipHit by using tables to perform the layout. To get with the modern times, I have redesigned the front page to use CSS layout instead of tables...was a bit more work, but it does make the page load faster. I have also changed the color scheme a bit making the text a bit darker and making Google URL's the traditional green. If you have more feedback about ChipHit, let me know.

Added Blog Refinement

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-28T17:48:31-04:00

Added a Blog refinement to the search engine as there are some engineering blogs out there related to ASIC/FPGA design. So far, I have found just one and added that to the refinement; however, the refinement will search all available ChipHit sites for blogs. Turns out that there are quite a few. So, if you know of a blog, submit it so ChipHit can search it.

Added Training and Language Refinements

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-20T21:19:29-04:00

Spent some of the day today putting in language and training refinements. Works pretty good. Try searching for sugar on ChipHit and refine to languages then search for sugar on standard Google...you will be impressed!

Added Search Bar Support for Firefox, Mozilla, and IE6

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-20T10:54:11-04:00

ChipHit has now added the ability to add itself to your browser's Search Bar on the front page. ChipHit is currently supporting Sherlock and OpenSearch protocols for adding custom search engines to your Search Bar. This means that we support Firefox 1.5 (Sherlock) as well Firefox 2.0 and IE6 (OpenSearch). Add us to your search bar for easy searching of your ASIC/FPGA topics.

If you did not know already, OpenSearch allows permits ChipHit to advertise its search capability to your browser. That advertisement appears in Firefox 2.0 like the image at right...note the glowing arrow. By pulling down the arrow, you can add ChipHit Search. Of course, for older versions (also works with newer versions too), we provide the traditional add link on our front page.

So, go ahead add our custom search engine to your browser...we will be only a click away!

Added suggestion and feedback features

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-17T21:55:02-04:00

Today we added Suggest a Site and Feedback sections to ChipHit. The Suggest a Site allows you to submit a site for us to add to the custom Google search engine. The feedback section allows you to send general feedback about ChipHit.

Added About

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-16T22:27:41-04:00

The site definitely needed a history and about section, so I put that together and posted it.

Discussion Forums are Live

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-14T23:52:20-04:00

The discussion site is up with some rudimentary forums. I figured we try to keep this simple-stupid with four boards: general discussion, FPGA talk, ASIC talk, and EDA talk. Enjoy :)

ChipHit.com is Alive

ted.boydston@chiphit.com — 2007-05-12T23:10:36-04:00

Well after many years of procrastinating, I decided to finally build something that is mine and that I can be proud of....welcome to ChipHit.com!

My goal is to make money while helping pizza-eating ASIC and FPGA designers to get to beer time faster! As is stands right now, the site simply features a custom Google search engine that searches a few hundred websites that are dedicated to the digital engineering space for ASIC and FPGA designers. Eventually, I plan on adding a nice message board so that designers can communicate. Oh, and of course, there is this blog, which I will update from time to time about my opinions. Other than that, I don't plan on adding stuff too much of my open IP...that becomes too tedious.

So, why should you come here? Well, if you are an engineer, you, like me are an expert, of course :). It just so happens that I love the internet, art, and design, and getting things done, so I decided to hack this site together that you to can use the web to get things done faster. Nice marketing...eh? Well, really, if you have ever used any search engine to find help for digital design, you too have run into the mish-mash of crazy results. This search engine helps, because it targets to a few websites that are known good, which means you get an answer faster. Oh, and since the ad-bots are now seeing these relationships, advertising that makes sense is here also.

Anyway, enjoy the site!