richb@yarra.OZ (Rich Burridge) (12/08/86)
I am looking for suggestions for the next version of calctool. Richard Collins suggested being able to press the keyboard keys as well as mouse button presses, and also being able to "put" the calculators result. I have implemented these, albeit the "putting" of negative numbers which the calculator displays leaves a lot of white space between the minus sign and the number. If somebody could show me a simple way of just "putting" what I want into the "put" buffer, I would be very happy. [To Richard Collins: I have received your mail, and tried several return paths to you, but they all bounce.] I am going to implement binary,octal,decimal and hexidecimal modes for calculations in the next release. I would still like your suggestions on what would be useful features. Lets be realistic about this. I have no intention of emulating an HP-11 programmable calculator, I only want to implement things that would be used from day to day. Depending upon the number of suggestions, I should be releasing a new version of calctool onto the net, early in the new year. Regards Rich. Rich Burridge ISD: +61 3 267-6222 Sun Australia STD: (03) 267-6222 14 Queens Rd, ARPA: richb%yarra.oz@seismo.css.gov Melbourne, VIC 3004. UUCP: seismo!munnari!yarra.oz!richb AUSTRALIA. ACS: richb@yarra.oz D D
roy@phri.UUCP (12/10/86)
I think I've found a bug in calctool, as posted to the net a little
while back. If you take the square root of a negative number, you get
"NaN" (Not a Number; should really be NaRN :-)). On the other hand, if you
try to divide by zero, you get "Error". Seems to me you should either get
"NaN" or "Error" both time. What do you math types think?
BTW, taking the square root of a negative number isn't easy, since
there isn't and +/- key. Have to do "0 - 1 srt". This minor problem
notwithstanding, I think calctool is pretty nifty and have put it in my
root menu.
--
Roy Smith, {allegra,cmcl2,philabs}!phri!roy
System Administrator, Public Health Research Institute
455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016
"you can't spell deoxyribonucleic without unix!"