HP Prime or HP 50g

[Tim Wessman]

(03-20-2014 09:39 PM)Voldemar Wrote:  For example, if I input in RPN mode 1234567890123 (number with more than 12 numerals) then ENTER, I got 1234567890120 (last figure turns to zero). Is this only on emulator?

This is not a bug. Rather, you have entered more then 12 digits when the floating point numerical mantissa is limited to 12 digits. The 50g will behave identical in this regard. I am not certain, but I suspect the 35s will behave in a similar fashion.

[Voldemar]

(03-20-2014 10:28 PM)Tim Wessman Wrote:  

(03-20-2014 09:39 PM)Voldemar Wrote:  For example, if I input in RPN mode 1234567890123 (number with more than 12 numerals) then ENTER, I got 1234567890120 (last figure turns to zero). Is this only on emulator?

This is not a bug. Rather, you have entered more then 12 digits when the floating point numerical mantissa is limited to 12 digits. The 50g will behave identical in this regard. I am not certain, but I suspect the 35s will behave in a similar fashion.

On HP 50g emulator I input 1234567890123 then ENTER, I got 1234567890123, then 1 +, I got 1234567890124. It is correct.
On HP 35s phisical calculator I input 1234567890123 then ENTER, I got 1,23456789012E12, then 1 +, I got 1,23456789012E12. It is correct too.
On HP Prime emulator I input 1234567890123 then ENTER, I got 1234567890120, then 1 +, I got 1234567890120. It is not correct. Then ten times (even more than ten times) 1 +, I still got 1234567890120. It is not corect. It is absolutely wrong.

[eried]

(03-20-2014 10:51 PM)Voldemar Wrote:  On HP Prime emulator I input 1234567890123 then ENTER, I got 1234567890120, then 1 +, I got 1234567890120. It is not correct. Then ten times (even more than ten times) 1 +, I still got 1234567890120. It is not corect. It is absolutely wrong.

In the physical calculator, in CAS works ok, but not in Home (works as you described)

[John R. Graham]

(03-20-2014 10:28 PM)Tim Wessman Wrote:  This is not a bug. Rather, you have entered more then 12 digits when the floating point numerical mantissa is limited to 12 digits. The 50g will behave identical in this regard. I am not certain, but I suspect the 35s will behave in a similar fashion.

I agree that it's not a bug but the 50g mimics this behavior only if exact mode is off. In exact mode, you can do math on the stack with arbitrary precision integers in RPN. To me, this is one of the off-putting things about the Prime right now: lack of RPN in CAS mode or, if you like, lack of arbitrary precision integer type in home mode. Really, the presence of the two modes feels like a kludge to me.

- John

[Michael de Estrada]

Speaking of things present in the 50g that are missing from the Prime, what happened to the great periodic table app ?

[parisse]

(03-20-2014 10:02 PM)Manolo Sobrino Wrote:  The fun part about teaching programming with a calculator is when you load the activities onto the calculator with your computer. You could be learning how to program it instead, but it's obvious that coding in the calculator has to be so much better... You can even code in a calculator with the emulator in your PC, how cool is that?

ANSI C hasn't changed since 1989 and probably everything in K&R will run for decades. We're talking about introducing programming to kids, not growing up and having auxiliary tools around, that is secondary. If school is about school things, what's the point of school?

Yes, programming in C is good because it is widely used in industry and you know the language will be available in the next 10, 20 .. years. But that's not important in the highschool teaching context because we do not teach to engineers. The idea of teaching a little programming in highschool is that in our modern world everyone should know what a test or a loop is. What's important here is that the langage must be easy to learn (otherwise the teacher will not be able to teach with it), and easily accessed, that is you can do a small programming exercice in the middle of a math course, that's why the calculator is prefered by many teachers to a more comfortable PC (despite the keyboard): just press ON then PROG and type your program (in the computer room you must wait at least 1 minute for boot, another one for login, another one to launch the programming environment etc.). In addition, you are much more confident that you will not loose your full hour in the computer room (that you had to reserve before) because the network does not work or the computers do not work because of a virus or someone who scratched the installation...
The easiest calc to teach programming is in my opinion the TI92/Voyage 200 : easy langage, qwerty keyboard, simple interface.

[Angus]

The rpn mode of the prime came up in previous posts. You have the comma key for swap. But you need to add a number to the stack. You cannot do something like (...calculations resulting to say 1 on stack level 1) 0.1 SWAP MINUS to calculate "1-0.1". You have to do 0.1 ENTER SWAP MINUS.

I cannot compare this behaviour with the 48 series but I think I memorize that my 48gx behaved differently.

In my eyes it makes no sense having an rpn with a command line that has to be added to a stack prior using stack commands. Entry should be part of the stack. Am i wrong? Francois being happy with rpn puzzles me.

Personally I would really like to have that changed in the soon to come update :-)



It also would be helpful if the function app could define the functions independend variable. Especially when you would like to visualize cas results you frequently have trouble with passing correct data to the app. F1:=f(x) is fine, but F1:=f(r) needs to substitude r to x. F1:=f(a,b,c,d) assigning a,b,c a constant value and use d as indep. variable is voodoo.
btw. I sign that the math exploration stuff is marketing only - these functions will never ever guide a kid to gain a better understanding...

I think Tim hinted that HP is somehow aware that the interconnection of the sub modules need more consistancy and we will have all these issues reworked.

[John R. Graham]

(03-20-2014 10:02 PM)Manolo Sobrino Wrote:  ... ANSI C hasn't changed since 1989 and probably everything in K&R will run for decades. ...

That turns out not to be the case. The ANSI/ISO C standard has had three major revisions since 1989. Nevertheless, the point was, I think, that teaching a language that you would encounter elsewhere (i.e., off calculator) would be a good idea. I happen to agree. However, Tim has previously explained that the implementation size of many traditional languages put them out of reach for the Prime.

- John

[Voldemar]

(03-21-2014 10:35 AM)Angus Wrote:  The rpn mode of the prime came up in previous posts. You have the comma key for swap. But you need to add a number to the stack. You cannot do something like (...calculations resulting to say 1 on stack level 1) 0.1 SWAP MINUS to calculate "1-0.1". You have to do 0.1 ENTER SWAP MINUS.

On HP 50g it is similar. You have to do 0,1 ENTER then right arrow (swap) then MINUS. When 0,1 is on the input line, right arrow do nothing.
On HP 50g, when last number is in input line (not on the stack) is posible it swap with number on stack level 1 with soft menu. STACK then down arrow then OK (or ENTER key). ENTER, SWAP (right arrow) takes 2 keypresses, using soft menu takes 3 keypresses.

[Manolo Sobrino]

(03-21-2014 11:17 AM)John R. Graham Wrote:  That turns out not to be the case. The ANSI/ISO C standard has had three major revisions since 1989. Nevertheless, the point was, I think, that teaching a language that you would encounter elsewhere (i.e., off calculator) would be a good idea. I happen to agree. However, Tim has previously explained that the implementation size of many traditional languages put them out of reach for the Prime.

- John

Actually C89/C90 "the original ANSI C" is the last ANSI C standard made by ANSI . The new standards come from ISO, C99 from ISO was adopted by ANSI (C95 was just an ISO extension) and then ISO replaced C99 with C11.

More than revisions all these are extensions. Any code written in C89/90 will be fine for a C11 compiler but for small details, the most spectacular being not allowing implicit int return type (you shouldn't do it anyway).

You're safe learning the basic stuff first. It's not like FORTRAN 77 vs 90, now that was a revision!

(edit)
The programming language in the Prime looks nice to me (for its purpose). I don't understand very well the type declaration of local variables, though.

[parisse]

For CAS programs, local declaration is not mandatory, it's a way to insure you did not mistype a variable name, if a variable is not declared, you get a warning about global variables.

[Arcturus314]

So I just bought a Prime for calculus and engineering... I can return it within 30 days, should I get a 50G instead? the Prime seems really education focused. I really like the screen and design of the Prime but am let down by its lack of engineering tools and CAS RPN. Will the prime get more engineering focused in the future? So whats the verdict?

[Kevin Ouellet]

I think they'll try to get it ready for Back to School 2014, then maybe they'll start adding extra features for engineers later.

[Arcturus314]

OK thank you. After spending more time with the Prime I think I will keep it, I love the screen and physical design. The only features that I think are necessary are RPN in cas and more consistency. Removing apps would also be useful, I don't need the explorer apps.

[John R. Graham]

(03-21-2014 11:39 AM)Voldemar Wrote:  On HP 50g it is similar. You have to do 0,1 ENTER then right arrow (swap) then MINUS. When 0,1 is on the input line, right arrow do nothing.
On HP 50g, when last number is in input line (not on the stack) is posible it swap with number on stack level 1 with soft menu. STACK then down arrow then OK (or ENTER key). ENTER, SWAP (right arrow) takes 2 keypresses, using soft menu takes 3 keypresses.

Not necessarily. Any function (intrinsic or user written) can be assigned to any key. I don't use HIST that much so I've assigned that key to execute SWAP. It works like it should: 0 1 HIST (now SWAP) leaves you with 1 0 on the stack. No extra keystrokes.

Alas, key redefinition is seriously broken on the Prime as of yet.

- John

[Voldemar]

(03-21-2014 05:49 PM)Arcturus314 Wrote:  So I just bought a Prime for calculus and engineering... I can return it within 30 days, should I get a 50G instead? the Prime seems really education focused. I really like the screen and design of the Prime but am let down by its lack of engineering tools and CAS RPN. Will the prime get more engineering focused in the future? So whats the verdict?

I've chosen. I will buy the HP 50g, not HP Prime. Maybe after some time Prime will become better. Then perhaps I will buy the Prime. Now it seems not the best choise. I made my choise after playing the emulators of both these calculators.

[Arcturus314]

(03-23-2014 07:19 PM)Voldemar Wrote:  

(03-21-2014 05:49 PM)Arcturus314 Wrote:  So I just bought a Prime for calculus and engineering... I can return it within 30 days, should I get a 50G instead? the Prime seems really education focused. I really like the screen and design of the Prime but am let down by its lack of engineering tools and CAS RPN. Will the prime get more engineering focused in the future? So whats the verdict?

I've chosen. I will buy the HP 50g, not HP Prime. Maybe after some time Prime will become better. Then perhaps I will buy the Prime. Now it seems not the best choise. I made my choise after playing the emulators of both these calculators.

Thank you for the help. Right now, the Prime is growing on me, but the 50G seems to be much better for engineering. I also prefer RPL. I'm not sure. I like the 50G, it seems like a much better choice right now, but the Prime's hardware is vastly superior. I do hope they update the OS of the prime though. With the bugs fixed, and the option to remove some of the useless programs (as well as maybe my aesthetics idea), it would become my calculator of choice.

[Arcturus314]

On a related note, how is the keyboard on the 50G? I love the Prime keyboard, as there is a lot more tactile feedback than my old TI calculator. Is the 50G similar? I need help with my dilemma...

[John Colvin]

(03-24-2014 12:03 AM)Arcturus314 Wrote:  On a related note, how is the keyboard on the 50G? I love the Prime keyboard, as there is a lot more tactile feedback than my old TI calculator. Is the 50G similar? I need help with my dilemma...

I own both the 50G and Prime and in my opinion, the keyboard on the 50G is just
as good as the Prime as far as tactile feedback. The 50G keyboard has
better contrasting color schemes than the Prime which is important for me in
low lighting conditions.

[Arcturus314]

(03-24-2014 12:26 AM)John Colvin Wrote:  

(03-24-2014 12:03 AM)Arcturus314 Wrote:  On a related note, how is the keyboard on the 50G? I love the Prime keyboard, as there is a lot more tactile feedback than my old TI calculator. Is the 50G similar? I need help with my dilemma...

I own both the 50G and Prime and in my opinion, the keyboard on the 50G is just
as good as the Prime as far as tactile feedback. The 50G keyboard has
better contrasting color schemes than the Prime which is important for me in
low lighting conditions.

Ok I think you might have persuaded me. I'll trade my Prime for a 50G. Are the keys hinged like the Prime or straight press like TI calcs?