Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1523825
JULY 2024 I DESIGN007 MAGAZINE 19 environmental condi- tions of the produce as it travels. We found a statistic that said over half of the produce transported is lost due to the environmental conditions in which it travels. The sen- sor is meant to help transpor ters under- stand where they can improve their condi- tions. To create the sen- sor, we got this huge ammo box. It had an Arduino in it. We sol- dered together the headers onto the PCB it s elf. Then we s o l- dered jumper cables and sensors to it. at's when I found out that my soware was actually better than my TA's. We gathered and worked on it as a unit in a studio-type space. at was our project. is next term was more focused on the soware development side. Matties: That's great. What else are you working on? I am still working on the PCB. It's an Arduino circuit board player or circuit playground. It's a board with a microprocessor: 10 analog inputs and five digital sensors. You can do a lot of different projects with it. I hook it up to my computer, deploy some code to it, and do a lot of interesting stuff with it. is term has been focused more on expanding my soware skills. at's the goal of the first year of engineering. Technically, I'm considered a general engineer until I declare. In the meantime, I'm learning different skills. e program lets me preview what I can do, but my professors encourage me to expand my skills. I want to be a mechanical engineer, but I've considered electrical engi- neering with a focus on soware. Oregon State makes soware development one of the easiest minors to pick up, which is great. ere are a lot of peo- ple who will pick up soware development along with their pri- mary degree. A good u n i v e r s i t y s h o u l d expose you to all sorts of things. You go in thinking you know what you know, but you don't know what you don't know. Matties: What do you think makes a good engineer? I think it's more about that person's core values and how they work. I've always been told that you can always learn. You can learn to be an electrical engineer or learn to do soware. But you need to have some inherent so skills, such as being a quick learner or being genuinely curi- ous. You must want to challenge what's already been established. As an engineer, your job is to challenge what's already there and synthesize the new with the old. Johnson: Dylan, can you draw a line between what you're doing now and how engineering is viewed in the university environment with your experience in FIRST Robotics? If I were to put an overall theme to everything that I've experienced here at school, what I'm working on in classes, and with FIRST Robot- ics, there's this theme of diversifying your skills. You really want to do as many things as you possibly can. When I was in FIRST Robot- ics, I worked in a shop. I was a machinist, but I also did a computer design grant. I was also the one who would go to public events and present Dylan Nguyen