The thread title says it all.

 

What's stupid about a shield?

 

Hello,

Do you mean the shield for an Arduino:
https://arduinohistory.github.io/

The shield is basicaly a plug-in board.

In January 2005, IDII hired David Cuartielles to develop a couple of plug-in boards for the Wiring board, for motor control and bluetooth connectivity.



Two plug-in boards developed at IDII by David Cuartielles and his brother. Bluetooth shield on the left, and a motor controller shield on the right

Bertus

 

Much less stupid than "Earthing" I would say

 

Is there a point to your whiny incessant bitching? Do you imagine it serves a useful purpose? I'll give you a clue -- it doesn't.

 

Much less stupid than "Earthing" I would say

(Earthing) What would be your choice ?
Max.

 

Also there is Mu-metal for magnetic Shield-ing!
Max.

 

It's a creative outlet satisfying the need to be clever and/or noncomforming.

For the C.H.I.P. SBC, they're called Dips (e.g. SALSA Dip). As in chips and dips.

For Raspberry Pi, they're called HATs (e.g. SENSE HAT).

 

If we are asking rhetorical questions......

Why a software malfunction is called a bug? Because in the early computer days, an insect found its way into a pair of relay contacts, preventing from making electrical contact, although the relay itself was properly closing.

Similarly, many of our words in the technical jargon were coined for similar reasons. I can see from the photos provided by Bertus, that with a little imagination one can imagine these boards as miniature warrior shields.

 

I guess my point here is that the concept of a board that plugs into another board has been common in the world of microprocessors and microcontrollers since the earliest days. There is simply no rational need to take the word "shield" for this, completely out of context too.

We have for example "daughter board" or "expansion board" or "peripheral board" or "peripheral adapter" or "sensor board" or "transducer card" and so on.

The use of good English is sadly declining, and this kind of thing doesn't help (e.g. consider the now common (mis)use of "invite" where "invitation" is actually correct).

 

If we are asking rhetorical questions......

Why a software malfunction is called a bug? Because in the early computer days, an insect found its way into a pair of relay contacts, preventing from making electrical contact, although the relay itself was properly closing.

Similarly, many of our words in the technical jargon were coined for similar reasons. I can see from the photos provided by Bertus, that with a little imagination one can imagine these boards as miniature warrior shields.

This is actually a common misconception.

The use of the term 'bug' to describe an error or problem in a system goes back nearly a century further and probably more. Thomas Edison used the term in his writings in a way that makes it pretty clear that he was not coining the term, but rather just using an existing common term.

Even the log entry for the infamous "bug" in the Mark II makes it clear that the term already was in widespread use. The operator (Wm Burke) taped the moth to the log book along with the whimsical entry that it was the first "actual" bug found in a computer and that they "debugged" the computer by removing it. He has stated that the only thing that prompted him to do that was because "bugs" and "debugging" were commonly used terms and the fact that this time it was a literal bug made it funny.