WIRED; It's Past Time for You To Ditch That Fancy Scientific Calculator

[Zac Bruce]

(08-09-2017 04:03 AM)Garth Wilson Wrote:  Is typing "google.com<Enter>sqrt(4.55) meters in feet" and waiting for the pages to load really any easier... You can't trust anyone who thinks Google is the only search engine, or even the best one.

No need to type google.com<enter> if you have google set up as your default search engine you would just type it directly into the URL bar and hit enter. I'm not sure about other browsers but in Chrome you don't even have to hit enter, the answer just appears under your URL bar. Waiting for the pages to load presumably isn't a problem for a lot of people anyway. If you spend a lot of your time behind a computer, I would argue that yes, it is much easier.

I doubt he thinks that google is the only search engine, just that is what most people would be familiar with, and more likely than not they have it set as the default search engine in their browser (Chrome holds something like 60% of the browser market). Google has become so ubiquitous that in many cases it is a used as a verb, when people really mean "use a search engine to find this". Out of interest, what do you use in place of google and why? I quite like the idea of DuckDuckGo, mostly because I'm a little uncomfortable with how much I let Google know about me.

I understand your point about being familiar with a calculator over a long period of time. I'm actually putting in some effort to learn how to use my calculator to it's full potential because I'm going to be using it throughout my degree. Perhaps I'll find I still have a use for it afterwards, I know I'm certainly attached to it now and use it often.

I imagine that the time spent learning to program your calculator (not long, admittedly) would probably be better spent learning to code in python, because it has wider applications, and is accessible anywhere that you have access to the internet; not just when you have access to your personal calculator. If you're a student and the institution actually allowed you access to python in examinations, it would be massively more beneficial than learning to use a calculator properly.


Thanks for the comments!

Zac