Ernie Werbel wrote:
Hi all. I am a part-time college student majoring in Electrical
Engineering Technology. I have been trying to learn as much as I can
on my own since I was twelve; about ten years now. The earliest
material I found was in books and experience in taking things apart. I
learned that electrons flowed out of the negative terminal of the
battery, through the circuit components, and back into the positive
terminal. Hence, I have always designed my projects around a
positive ground point. No problems there. Well for the past year I have
finally gotten into the hardcore
electronics-related classes at the college. Some material is
familiar, but most of it is new. I am doing well however I have
difficulty with the fact that the modern textbooks are showing the
circuits using a negative ground. This seems backwards. I know the
circuit will still work the same way, but it's hard to get myself to
think in the negative-ground sense. If I look at a positive-grounded
circuit, I can envision the electrons and make calculations without
difficulty, but it's a different story with negative ground for me.
What is anyone else's takes on this?
Ernie

There is no standard that says negative is ground. Circuits can be built
with either or no polarity grounded. There are reasons for one particular
grounding scheme in some circumstances to do with metal migration and
corrosion (telephone exchange/cables), but that is not relevant in general
electronics.

Current flow is positive to negative - that is the convention by which
directional components are described and illustrated. Electrons actually
travel from neg to pos, but that is irrelevant. This has nothing to do with
'ground'.

Just forget about electron flow direction, it will just distract you.

geoff