A case against the x<>y key

[Les Bell]

(05-10-2015 10:43 AM)hansklav Wrote:  Well, as Paul Dale pointed out, on a four level stack RPN calculator then you will run into trouble (stack overflow, leading to a wrong answer, without warning), unless, of course, you make use of STO and RCL.

No, you don't. As it happens, I started with the most complicated term in that equation, which happened to be at the right-hand end, and then worked to the left, adding - and subtracting - terms, but never ran out of stack. It would have worked equally well going from left to right, though.

So I'm afraid I'm still not seeing a problem. In practice, RPN users tend to be scientists and engineers, for whom the calculation represents physical quantities and logical steps in getting an answer. RPN meets their needs very well with a four-level stack. It only runs into trouble if you try to evaluate complex algebraic expressions left-to-right in a kind of mindlessly algorithmic fashion. I can't help feeling that you're approaching RPN with the wrong mindset.