Printable catalog (PDF)
Analog Devices (who have a lot of great app notes locked up in their stable) have made available in PDF format enough good information and reading material to keep you busy for the rest of the winter while you wait for warm enough weather that you want to step outside again. Their Linear Circuit Design Handbook has a lot of excellent material, and can also be ordered in printed format if you’re still a fan of a good old highlighter and notes in the margin like me.
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Every EE should have a copy of the "Linear Circuit Design Handbook" from Analog Devices Inc. (ADI) on their machine. The full book (ISBN 978-0-7506-8703-4, c.2008) is a 34MB .pdf download (950+ pages) from ADI.
There is a lot more stuff from ADI in their "Library" and elsewhere on the ADI site, which is not "locked-up" (quoting the OP) at all in my experience.
Also keep an eye on ADI’s "Analog Diablog" Blog site. Lots of good stuff there. Fairly frequent updates and you can subscribe to the feed. See here:
http://analogdiablog.blogspot.com/
The print version of the "Linear Circuit Design Handbook" at around $100 USD is not outrageous IMO.
Where I live in S.E. Asia I can print at a just-in-time printer 1,000 pages double-sized A4, black and white only, at around $40 USD for a single job. Roughly double that for a color-capable print job. Add roughly five bucks for spiral-binding in two or three volumes. The print job would take a couple-few hours between drop-off and pick-up. Though I need to look at the copyright and license though to see if this is legal for personal use (no resale).
Disclaimer: I do not work for Analog Devices in any way. I just use their parts (where appropriate) but wish their parts were easier to purchase (not sample – I don’t "sample" as a rule) in small quantities for prototype and test. IMO Maxim suffers from this problem as well. But to be fair, many of the parts from ADI and Maxim are very unique.
Comment by Drone — February 9, 2012 @ 12:01 pm
Drone: About the “locked up”, I simply meant a lot of these big Engineering Inc. semiconductor vendors have some amazing app notes, white papers, etc., but sometimes they just seem to get lost and buried … but one of the things I love so much about engineering is that it was into freely sharing hard-won knowledge and an open source mentality long before the terms ever caught on. Analog definately has some gems, though, this one near the top of the list, and still a great deal at $100. It’s like 20 years of experience for less than a days wage.
Comment by Kevin — February 10, 2012 @ 10:07 am