Google and / or Wolfram Alpha

[kgun]

Google is now competing with http://www.wolframalpha.com/ the well known computational knowledge engine according to this

Google Just Got A Lot Better At Math

WebPronews article.

Related link:

Google Gets Scientific, Adds A Voice-Enabled 34-Button Calculator To Desktop And Mobile Search

Google search has long featured a built-in calculator function but a recent update added a fully functional 34-button scientific calculator. Previously, when a user entered, say, 2+2, Google would simply display the sum above the search result. Now, when that equation is entered into the search bar, the answer pops up along with the new calculator. Best of all, this works in mobile browsers and voice search, too.


This isn’t a stripped down calculator, either. It’s a full-power, voice-enabled scientific calculator with nearly all the functions of a tangible model. Plus, it doesn’t require two AAA batteries. A Google Product Manager pointed out in this post’s comments that the scientific functions appear when the phone is rotated to be viewed in a landscape mode.

Seems that is not yet availble on

google.no

[michaelh73]

Well google still has some work to do. If you do '198!' on both of the calculators you'll find an error in googles calc, however it works fine on wolframs. Wolfram also allows you to use the keyboard to actually type out the calculations. Google you have to click the buttons on the calc

[weegillis]

Wolfram has nothing to worry about. They are a completely different breed, and are under no threat of extinction if this is all Google can come up with. Can it run out a series? No. Can it do complex factoring? No. It's not doing math; it's only doing arithmetic.

[SEOforGoogle]

I don't think Google is sweating about this...

[kgun]

Well google still has some work to do. If you do '198!' on both of the calculators you'll find an error in googles calc, however it works fine on wolframs.

But that is a serious objection.

A few months ago I talked to my professor in mathematics from the University of Oslo. He is also working at a Norwegian research institute. I asked him the following question:

Which software do you use to solve applied mathematical and numerical analysis problems?

His answer:

The only software we use is Mathematica from Wolfram research. Most often however, we have to make our own software.

Even small errors can have dramatic concequences.

But after a while, most programmers realize that this means that a program is equipped with a safety net: many errors that programmers make when they construct programs are caught by this net before they lead to unpleasant effects. An example: A very expensive American space rocket crashed on its way to Venus a few years ago, because of an extremely trivial error in a FORTRAN program. A comma had be written as a point, and, as a consequence of that, the start of a special kind of repeat imperative was mistakenly read as an assignment imperative assigning a value to an undeclared variable. Had it been required to declare every variable in FORTRAN programs, the compiler would have discovered that the variable was undeclared and the error would have been caught much earlier than in the Atlantic Ocean.

Source: Professor Bjørn Kirkerud (1989): "Object Oriented Programming With Simula". Addison Wesley Publishing Company ISBN 0 201 17574 6. Page 31-32.

The factorial function ! is so central in statistics and probabilistics that the above reported error is critical.

In addition, Wolfrom Alpha can produce the output directly to a PDF document. And that output is not trivial. Look for yourself.

Wolfram has nothing to worry about. They are a completely different breed, and are under no threat of extinction if this is all Google can come up with. Can it run out a series? No. Can it do complex factoring? No. It's not doing math; it's only doing arithmetic.

Agree.

198! is not inifinity as reported by Google.