Simple questions

[tavaritz]

Hello.

I just bought a new HP 50g and started to learn how to use it for the best performance and noticed something pecualiar:

In Tool menu after pressing NXT there are two soft key entries: CASCH and HELP.

But both of these open the same selection dialog labeled "CAS help on:"

Is this deliberate or is there some information missing from my calculator?

Also not all functions have help entries. Is there anywhere one could download the missing help info?

Topi

Here's little HP bio of mine: When I was preteen I bought HP-25 and was quite miffed when HP introduced the C-version without possibility to upgrade. When I realised that I'd need printouts my eyes turned to HP-97C, but it was too expensive for someone who was buying ones wants with an allowance. So I went to a summer job and bougth HP-19C. I had binders full of pasted printouts of the programs I had made, but still I wanted that HP-97C for the ability to save the programs on magnetic cards and started to save money. Never bought that because HP-41C was introduced and I bought that instead. Had magnetic card reader, printer, optical wand, quad memory module and the PPC module when I sold it and graduated to computers. When I was made redundant in 2003 I studied to be an elctrician and bought HP 33s for various calculations. Talk about flimsy and pecualiarly limited thing: 31k memory, 27+6 memory locations, 26 labels. Why the memory when you can't use it all. When I heard that HP had made a calculator that was as sturdy as the old ones I bought HP 50g and here I am.

[Steve Simpkin]

Welcome to the forum!
The best source of software and documentation for the HP50g is at
http://www.hpcalc.org/

The HP-25 was also my first HP calculator. It took me through High School, four years of college and the first couple of years of work. I then moved on to the HP-11C, HP-28C, HP-28S and finally the HP-48S which I still use today for work.

Since you are a long time RPN user, I will be curious to hear what your experience will be with using RPL on the HP50g. I love RPL but not every long time HP calculator user does.

[Joe Horn]

(03-26-2016 10:08 AM)tavaritz Wrote:  I just bought a new HP 50g and started to learn how to use it for the best performance and noticed something pecualiar:

In Tool menu after pressing NXT there are two soft key entries: CASCH and HELP.

But both of these open the same selection dialog labeled "CAS help on:"

Is this deliberate or is there some information missing from my calculator?

The first one is CASCMD, not CASCH. To see the button's full name, press right-shift down-cursor to see all six menu keys' full names.

The only difference between CASCMD and HELP is that CASCMD takes an input whereas HELP does not. If the input for CASCMD is a string, e.g. "SIMPLIFY", then it automatically jumps to that entry in the help catalog. It also works if the string is not the whole command name but just its first character(s), e.g. "X" CASCMD jumps to XNUM. The HELP command always starts at the top of the catalog. Both are programmable.

Do you have a copy of the HP 50g Advanced User's Reference Manual? The above information is all in there.

Quote:Also not all functions have help entries.

The help system is only for the CAS commands (Chapter 4 of the AUR).

Quote:Is there anywhere one could download the missing help info?

Bill Markwick wrote an awesome library that adds a complete help system for all the non-CAS commands and functions. Highly recommended. I use it so much that I keep it assigned to a key (left-shift-hold MTH). Check it out: http://www.hpcalc.org/search.php?query=hlp49

[Vtile]

There is also searchable AURm somewhere, which is superb as it saves your nerves through time. Which is made by above poster?