Beware not to buy HP Prime, if you are engineer!

[aurelio]

(05-05-2018 01:38 PM)pier4r Wrote:  Yes but no one stops you to create an equation library for the prime (and share it).

It seems to me that your point is "I want something ready made, for this the 50g with built in or community programs covers more needs than the prime, without me defining this or that equation".

But that's a lazy argument in my view. If I need something, I check if it is already done, otherwise I do it. Maybe long algorithms can be an obstacle, but equations are easy.

Pick this for example: https://www.easycalculation.com/formulas/index.php
There may be hundreds of equations there. But it is unlikely that one needs all of them at once. One may need, say, 10 of them. Then it is not that difficult to type them and organize them as you need it.

It is good to (a) have your setup, (b) ensure that it is what you need and (c) be more familiar with the system.
The more areas you are going to cover, the more complete the list become.

If instead I complain that no one is going to type all those equations for me in the device, meh.

I can understand an argument against the, say, 9860 series of the casio. There there is no way to name variables or to make variable scope only local, so to avoid overwrite variables used by other programs. One is limited with the programs, the labels have only 6 (or 8?) characters, and so on. So it is clumsy to build an extensive list of equations, although it is possible.

With the prime is really trivial. The HP PPL, although limited (ex: chars in variable names or function names are like "max 30" IIRC), is powerful and expressive.

And then, once again, if the prime is not for engineers because it is not filled with every possible formula, what about the older models from hp? Aside from 50g, 49g+, 49 series. Did the 71B or the 41 or the 67 model have all the formulas builtin without need of buying expansions? (or typing the formulas)

So even that is garbage?

I mean, I love the 50g. I have four (no other calculator is so present in my home). But to claim that all the others are garbage based on some weak argument is a bit of bad taste.

For example - I did not know this until some weeks ago - the 35. The first calculator. It is not better than any scientific calculator that you can get for 30 euro today in terms of functions. Nonetheless there is at least one book ( HP-35 Math Pac ) that collects a lot of equations for the 35 (of course one can adapt them to every calculator). For me a 35 plus that book is quite complete, one doesn't need much more if the need is to solve single equations.

So if the 35 can do it, the prime can do it too.

Hi Pier, how are you?
I agree with you more than with dmmaster, no doubt, but he didn't say, I guess, and even thought that the prime is garbage.
Then I sold my prime two years ago ...and just for a low level reason (which for me is enough): I "hate" its keyboard.... still difficult for me to read, unpleasant to use.
maybe it was really designed mostly for educationals targets and so suited for people younger than me.
Hope in changes, anyway, who knows...all can be improved and I think that the next calculator will show us an amazing interface.
Sure most people expects to get a calculator which contains everything available and ready for use like goods on the shelves in stores, but the experience teachs how specialists, don't care if engineers technicians or workers, are inclined in building or adapting their best tools...... tailored for the excellence.

edit: typos

[Marco Polo]

(05-08-2018 09:37 PM)aurelio Wrote:  maybe it was really designed mostly for educationals targets

Sure most people expects to get a calculator which contains everything available and ready for use like goods on the shelves in stores, but the experience teachs how specialists, don't care if engineers technicians or workers, are inclined in building or adapting their best tools...... tailored for the excellence

I totally agree with you: IMHO Prime is designed as an educational tool, aimed to the learning of math., geometry, stat&prob, etc.
On the other side the 48-49-50 are clearly aimed to the professional, due to the great customizability and the lack of bells&wisthles....just like a Swiss knife.
IMHO the addition of CAS to the 49 and 50 has slightly "diluted" the professional content of such calcs trying to catch the educational market.

Just my two cents

Cheers
Marco Polo

[toml_12953]

(05-09-2018 06:03 AM)Marco Polo Wrote:  IMHO the addition of CAS to the 49 and 50 has slightly "diluted" the professional content of such calcs trying to catch the educational market.

Just my two cents

Cheers
Marco Polo

I don't see why adding a feature dilutes the suitability to professionals. If they don't need the feature, then just don't use it.

That reminds me of someone who wanted me to write a simplified BASIC interpreter for teaching younger students. It was to be a subset of full BASIC. I asked why and the person said, "It's too complicated otherwise." I told her to just teach the parts of BASIC the students needed such as PRINT, IF..THEN, GOTO, LET and leave out the other parts such as PRINT USING, IF..THEN..ELSE, transcendentals and other advanced features. No need to write a separate interpreter. As the students progress, other features could be introduced seamlessly rather than having to deal with subtle incompatibilities that could be produced by writing a separate interpreter. She agreed and we worked out a complete syllabus using a subset of full BASIC and a growth path upward from there. It was an amazing success.

[John Keith]

(05-09-2018 06:03 AM)Marco Polo Wrote:  IMHO the addition of CAS to the 49 and 50 has slightly "diluted" the professional content of such calcs trying to catch the educational market.

Just my two cents

Cheers
Marco Polo

Other than a negative influence on keyboard layout I don't see a downside to the CAS. The availability of exact integers and good number theory functions etc. make the CAS more than worthwhile to me.

John

[dmmaster]

(05-08-2018 09:37 PM)aurelio Wrote:  

(05-05-2018 01:38 PM)pier4r Wrote:  Yes but no one stops you to create an equation library for the prime (and share it).

It seems to me that your point is "I want something ready made, for this the 50g with built in or community programs covers more needs than the prime, without me defining this or that equation".

But that's a lazy argument in my view. If I need something, I check if it is already done, otherwise I do it. Maybe long algorithms can be an obstacle, but equations are easy.

Pick this for example: https://www.easycalculation.com/formulas/index.php
There may be hundreds of equations there. But it is unlikely that one needs all of them at once. One may need, say, 10 of them. Then it is not that difficult to type them and organize them as you need it.

It is good to (a) have your setup, (b) ensure that it is what you need and (c) be more familiar with the system.
The more areas you are going to cover, the more complete the list become.

If instead I complain that no one is going to type all those equations for me in the device, meh.

I can understand an argument against the, say, 9860 series of the casio. There there is no way to name variables or to make variable scope only local, so to avoid overwrite variables used by other programs. One is limited with the programs, the labels have only 6 (or 8?) characters, and so on. So it is clumsy to build an extensive list of equations, although it is possible.

With the prime is really trivial. The HP PPL, although limited (ex: chars in variable names or function names are like "max 30" IIRC), is powerful and expressive.

And then, once again, if the prime is not for engineers because it is not filled with every possible formula, what about the older models from hp? Aside from 50g, 49g+, 49 series. Did the 71B or the 41 or the 67 model have all the formulas builtin without need of buying expansions? (or typing the formulas)

So even that is garbage?

I mean, I love the 50g. I have four (no other calculator is so present in my home). But to claim that all the others are garbage based on some weak argument is a bit of bad taste.

For example - I did not know this until some weeks ago - the 35. The first calculator. It is not better than any scientific calculator that you can get for 30 euro today in terms of functions. Nonetheless there is at least one book ( HP-35 Math Pac ) that collects a lot of equations for the 35 (of course one can adapt them to every calculator). For me a 35 plus that book is quite complete, one doesn't need much more if the need is to solve single equations.

So if the 35 can do it, the prime can do it too.

Hi Pier, how are you?
I agree with you more than with dmmaster, no doubt, but he didn't say, I guess, and even thought that the prime is garbage.
Then I sold my prime two years ago ...and just for a low level reason (which for me is enough): I "hate" its keyboard.... still difficult for me to read, unpleasant to use.
maybe it was really designed mostly for educationals targets and so suited for people younger than me.
Hope in changes, anyway, who knows...all can be improved and I think that the next calculator will show us an amazing interface.
Sure most people expects to get a calculator which contains everything available and ready for use like goods on the shelves in stores, but the experience teachs how specialists, don't care if engineers technicians or workers, are inclined in building or adapting their best tools...... tailored for the excellence.

edit: typos

Do you make you bread, milk, butter,... yourself? no?
(let's catch attention).

I think that there is a clear, normal, decrease of the level in maths. This can be easily measured. Take old books, and compare. I see for each ~10 years, a level of 1 year decrease (12 months). In the past, education in maths was really something.

This is normal, technology replaces basics use.

The HP Prime is NOT at all garbage. It is an excellent graphical calc, which is in excellent competition with Casio and TI. The intention of HP was to get into this direction (school, secondary,...).

There is no harm at all, it is normal. Money rules the world.

[Luigi Vampa]

I have seldom (if ever) used to lean on HP48/49/50 equations' libraries. Although they are an impressive collection, I have always felt most of them don't dive deep enough in the subject at hand. I prefer to know the core equations and constants. For me they are simply nice to have, especially when you happen to need some 'collateral knowledge'... seldom in my case. Besides, I prefer to write my own 'ad hoc' programs.
It is all up to which tool you enjoy the most; but the production of human endorphins is really a subjective matter.

[pier4r]

Dmmaster no I don't do the butter alone, but that is the base. I cook by myself. Cooking is like writing short recipes.

If you say "books of math in the past were great and today they are poor"(I disagree. There is a lot of math around in those days if you know what to look) and then at the same time you want to sell the idea that creating your equation library is hard, you create a contradiction. If you want to say that people that studied in the past put more effort and quality in their actions, then they have no need of ready made equation libraries as they are used to put a bit of effort.

Sorry but your argument is fighting itself in my view. Others have provided better points.

[Vtile]

(05-09-2018 07:38 PM)Luigi Vampa Wrote:  I have seldom (if ever) used to lean on HP48/49/50 equations' libraries. Although they are an impressive collection, I have always felt most of them don't dive deep enough in the subject at hand. I prefer to know the core equations and constants. For me they are simply nice to have, especially when you happen to need some 'collateral knowledge'... seldom in my case. Besides, I prefer to write my own 'ad hoc' programs.
It is all up to which tool you enjoy the most; but the production of human endorphins is really a subjective matter.

Yes, the build in equation library (is it btw HPs or some community members work, as it seems like some features (many) did come from outside HP, but were later on added to the evaluation models of 28/48 family). ...where I was... Yes the build in library is too broad and too general, man if it would have had a build in equation library manager.. Like the Tim Wesmans? PEQUM or some more advanced ones. That would have been a killer.

What is told about the "quality" of maths I can partially agree, most of the decline (note, local exposure) is the deep understanding of the core principles and the quality how they are put down to the book. Obviously in times when the calculator were worth of engineers month or two salary (constant for low-end high-tech equipment) the core knowledge of number manipulation were much more important. Now you can just press the SQRT button of the calculator, not in the 1960s for most.

In the end higher end math is just a pattern recognition. A modular system, where high houses are build from the modest bricks and mortar.

https://youtu.be/EKWGGDXe5MA

[Marco Polo]

(05-09-2018 06:54 PM)toml_12953 Wrote:  I don't see why adding a feature dilutes the suitability to professionals. If they don't need the feature, then just don't use it.

As a matter of fact the addition of CAS has brought a suboptimal keyboard layout: the useless SYMB and X keys were added at the expenses of Enter key, reduced in size a located in the wrong place. Not to mention the upward shift of operator keys, just to make space for Enter.
Furthermore the addition of CAS changed the menus and made them confused.
I can ignore Cas, but not the it's consequences.
In conclusion, of course IMHO, the addition of Cas to the 48 series gave birth to a 48-50 which is less usable for some categories of professionals.

Just two words about equation library. I started having one in 1991 with my 48sx. Never used in 27 years except the MES and the periodic table....

[dmmaster]

(05-10-2018 05:56 AM)Marco Polo Wrote:  

(05-09-2018 06:54 PM)toml_12953 Wrote:  I don't see why adding a feature dilutes the suitability to professionals. If they don't need the feature, then just don't use it.

As a matter of fact the addition of CAS has brought a suboptimal keyboard layout: the useless SYMB and X keys were added at the expenses of Enter key, reduced in size a located in the wrong place. Not to mention the upward shift of operator keys, just to make space for Enter.
Furthermore the addition of CAS changed the menus and made them confused.
I can ignore Cas, but not the it's consequences.
In conclusion, of course IMHO, the addition of Cas to the 48 series gave birth to a 48-50 which is less usable for some categories of professionals.

Just two words about equation library. I started having one in 1991 with my 48sx. Never used in 27 years except the MES and the periodic table....

I believe that the best place for ENTER of 2 key size is to be mid calc on left size exactly like the hp48gx. I dont know why. it looks natural to me.

thank you for the video of M. Prof. Feynmann.

I would be interested to know who first realized the cas system for hp. that was really early.... is the cas on hp prime much much better

[Eddie W. Shore]

I honestly don't get constant put down on the HP Prime and how it supposedly is not "engineering approved".

Personally, I think both the Prime and 50g (and many others) are suitable for engineering.

[Michael de Estrada]

I think there is a misconception that engineers use calculators as miniature computers, whereas that all ended decades ago with the ready availability of desktop microcomputers. When I was still working, I mostly used my calculator to perform simple manual tasks, such as units conversions. Sure, I had some simple programs I had written, but they were not particularly demanding of memory or cpu speed. My first calculator was an HP 35 that replaced my sliderule and my last before retirement was an HP 50g. I bought a Prime long after retirement as a toy, and if I were still working it would definitly NOT replace my HP 50g. As an engineer, I want something that is simple to use, and in that regard the 50g is better than the Prime. For example, it takes more than twice as many keystrokes and is a lot more convoluted to perform a simple units conversion on the Prime than the 50g. Also, the Prime deleted useful apps from the 50g like the Periodic Table, and replaced them with children’s apps like the Triangle Solver. No doubt HP has seen the writing on the wall, and focused on the educational market with the Prime, knowing full well that the professional market is shrinking, which explains their discontinuation of the 50g.

[hewlpac]

(05-10-2018 09:08 AM)dmmaster Wrote:  

(05-10-2018 05:56 AM)Marco Polo Wrote:  As a matter of fact the addition of CAS has brought a suboptimal keyboard layout: the useless SYMB and X keys were added at the expenses of Enter key, reduced in size a located in the wrong place. Not to mention the upward shift of operator keys, just to make space for Enter.
Furthermore the addition of CAS changed the menus and made them confused.
I can ignore Cas, but not the it's consequences.
In conclusion, of course IMHO, the addition of Cas to the 48 series gave birth to a 48-50 which is less usable for some categories of professionals.

Just two words about equation library. I started having one in 1991 with my 48sx. Never used in 27 years except the MES and the periodic table....

I believe that the best place for ENTER of 2 key size is to be mid calc on left size exactly like the hp48gx. I dont know why. it looks natural to me.

thank you for the video of M. Prof. Feynmann.

I would be interested to know who first realized the cas system for hp. that was really early.... is the cas on hp prime much much better

It is simply a matter of what you get used to. The ENTER key should be on the same side as the operations + - * /. We are used to the left as it is what we got used to. HP-42 / 48 ... put the shift function keys and the like on the left .... Once you use a calculator it becomes second nature.. it is only in transition or if you use multiple calcs (ie collectors) does it become an issue...

[dmmaster]

(05-10-2018 04:58 PM)Michael de Estrada Wrote:  ... No doubt HP has seen the writing on the wall, and focused on the educational market with the Prime, knowing full well that the professional market is shrinking, which explains their discontinuation of the 50g.

I fully agreeeeee !! $ !

Working with symbolics/variables is really made awful with the HP Prime. It does not proceed well equations. But, maybe, things are similar on HP Prime, as previous HP calcs.
It was really clean and comfortable to use with the HP48/49/50 for all maths. Don't you think?

[Russel]

If you are an engineer, you should be fully qualified to determine if the HP prime is the best calculator for your needs.

Just saying...

[dmmaster]

(05-10-2018 10:41 PM)Russel Wrote:  If you are an engineer, you should be fully qualified to determine if the HP prime is the best calculator for your needs.

Just saying...

Or you may just read what is written on the box of Prime...

It looks performant enough on it.

[smp]

(05-10-2018 07:25 PM)dmmaster Wrote:  

(05-10-2018 04:58 PM)Michael de Estrada Wrote:  ... No doubt HP has seen the writing on the wall, and focused on the educational market with the Prime, knowing full well that the professional market is shrinking, which explains their discontinuation of the 50g.

I fully agreeeeee !! $ !

Working with symbolics/variables is really made awful with the HP Prime. It does not proceed well equations. But, maybe, things are similar on HP Prime, as previous HP calcs.
It was really clean and comfortable to use with the HP48/49/50 for all maths. Don't you think?

Yeah, just look at that excellent (not) display. Those terrible blocky characters kept me away from all the HP graphics calculators - until the Prime. And, I'm an Engineer, too.

smp

[smp]

(05-10-2018 10:41 PM)Russel Wrote:  If you are an engineer, you should be fully qualified to determine if the HP prime is the best calculator for your needs.

Just saying...

I could not agree more! Thanks!

smp

[Russel]

(05-11-2018 02:48 PM)dmmaster Wrote:  Or you may just read what is written on the box of Prime...

It looks performant enough on it.

That is one way to determine if a calculator has what you need or want. I wouldn't limit myself to the information that is on the package.

Also, keep in mind that the best calculator for one person (or engineer) may not be the best for someone else.

[Michael de Estrada]

(05-11-2018 04:18 PM)Russel Wrote:  Also, keep in mind that the best calculator for one person (or engineer) may not be the best for someone else.

A lot of it is generational, too. I’m in my 70s and have been an RPN person all my life. Not being able to program in RPN/RPL is a deal breaker for me. As all us old RPN people retire, there is less and less demand for RPN programmability, and the Prime becomes more viable in the engineering market.