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What calculator do you use ?
alm:
Sage can mix HTML (and Latex) with math and graphing, although I'm not sure if I would use it for long/complex documents. One issue is publishing: since the Sage engine is not exactly lightweight, you can't access some features (like interactive graphs) when serving the documents to the public. You can only access these features if you're logged in, and I would be surprised if there weren't any security issues with providing random strangers with a login since you essentially have access to a full Python interpreter. There may be a PDF/HTML export option for static documents, I've never looked for it. It does have its own 'publish' feature, but that requires running Sage on a server accessible to the recipients.
There is also sagetex, which makes it possible to call Sage and include the results within a Latex document. This would probably be the closest to what you want, and much better for complex documents than the toy word processor that Mathematica and Maple provide.
I believe Sage is by far the closest thing to an OSS Mathematica/Maple clone. Too bad Windows support is limited to non-existent.
HLA-27b:
Local solver is a must of course. Even if security is disregarded we can not always depend on availability of a server and 99% of the work is trivial anyway.
On a side note, I wonder what can be done using an analog computer linked to a CAS.
Recently red this presentation about analog computers solving protein folding problems. Apparently there is still some research on the topic. The interesting bit is that it uses three dimensional bulk resistor networks consisting of conductive fluid. It also works realtime (as do all analog computers I believe).
HLA-27b:
Now here is exactly what I want my calculator to do (just arrived in YT)
I want to be able to create this kind of documents using a GUI without having to write code. I also want to be able to use/modify documents created by other people and perhaps have a library covering all the topics I am interested in.
Mark:
I have a couple of Sharp EL9300 graphics, but I mainly use an old Casio fx-5500L "Scientific Library" for the base-n features.
It does 32 bit binary, and it's really fast to use for conversions between dec, hex and bin.
Are there any more modern scientific calcs with 32bit binary?
saturation:
Calculators are helpful to me because it works faster than on a PC, or my Android phone. Ergonomics play a large factor. However, once the data set I'm using goes over 10+, or I'm using paper to track portions of calculations, it time to move to a PC, it also justifies the setup time.
I get to use most of the functions on my FX260, as I've had with all its ancestors. Some more than others.
There are USB calculators than allow you to pass the data sets to PCs. But they charge far more than an FX260,tend to be large, you'd have to justify its cost on the frequency of use. Basic USB calculator keypads alone cost more than many scientific calculators.
Smartphone, iPad or equivalent could be the final death knell for professional use of calculators. A suitably well written app would then have the same form as a calculator but far larger, with beeps and vibrations compensating for the lack of physical switches. I find the iPad form suitable to replace my FX260, but the true size of the FX260, weight, cost, portability and robustness still wins out, so my FX260 is alive and well. But, when I'm on the road and KISS is important, I use my RealCalc Android calculator instead of lugging yet another item.
--- Quote from: jerry507 on April 26, 2012, 03:48:21 pm ---I had a TI-89 for most of college and loved it. I also used Matlab a lot, like many of you. I realized that I used my TI-89 entirely for hand calculations, but never used it's programability.
Generally this isn't an issue for the desk which is why I think the calculator market is in trouble.
What I really wanted to know, and I think will give us more insight into what calculator we use and why we hate newer ones, is what we actually use calculators (of all forms including Matlab) for these days. I work in embedded design and software, and I rarely use a calculator these days. My main applications are simple math for footprint dimensions and converting numbers between variable bases. What about everyone else?
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