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What sort of calculator do you use?
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Thursday December 12 2019, @03:48PM (3 children)
Was introduced to RPN in 1989, first calculator was a HP-15C because that was the recommendation of DeVry Institute at that time and they had a deal with EduCalc. (And that was the first calculator I owned. Calculators were expensive and not allowed when I was in High School.)
Then in 1990 I got a 28C. Then that got stolen. Back to the 15C. I still miss that 28C.
In 1991 I bought a 48S. Used that for 20+ years.
Downloaded MathU RPN when I got my Palm T|X and bought the iPhone app when I got an iPhone and that came out.
Bought a 50g when the 48S died. Never liked it much.
Got an HP Prime about a year ago because I took a class where I could use any calculator but couldn't use my phone. Parts are interesting (the spreadsheet helped) but I don't have the same love for it that I did for my 48S or my 28C. I hate little bugs in it like you have to be in CAS mode to use the apps properly and when I'm on the stack I want nothing but RPN. I'd love to actually learn programming for it but don't have the time.
On my phone I have the HP Prime Lite app and MathU RPN and MathU 12D. Thought about upgrading the Prime app but haven't.
These days I'm far more likely to use Excel. MathU RPN second. Prime 3rd.
That said, some day very soon I hope to get a Swissmicros DM-42. Just because. And if I had unlimited resources (I don't) I'd add a DM15 or DM15L to come back to where it all started for me.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday December 12 2019, @04:16PM (2 children)
I had a 28C and had a lot of fun with it. I was studying Common Lisp at the time, and realized this calculator seemed to have some sort of GC.
I also remember the 28 C's unit conversions being the best I've ever seen. They distilled it down to everything being in fundamental units of various dimensions to some power times a constant. Like, length, time, electrical charge, and other dimensions. Every unit value was the product of these basic units each raised to some power (even power of zero for unused units). So area was simply length^2 and all other basic units to the zero power. Velocity was length^1 * time^-1. (aka distance per time) Thus it was possible for you to name your own new unit and simply assign the one constant and powers of all the fundamental units. Then you could multiply, say, 3 Foobars times 8 MilesPerHour and get a result that made sense, including dimensionally. I haven't run across any other calculator or software that did unit conversions this way.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday December 12 2019, @04:18PM (1 child)
I might mean HP 28S. It's been so long.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Thursday December 12 2019, @07:35PM
I wanted the 28S after my 28C was stolen, but couldn't afford it. By the time I could the 48 was out so I bought the 48S (couldn't afford the 48SX). That one, though, lost that symbolic ability to define one's own units.
This sig for rent.