kfr@dip.eecs.umich.edu (K. Fritz Ruehr) (10/29/90)
I have a friend with an AT&T 3B2 system running turn-key software for
advertising agencies under System V. He has a $1500 IBM PC/XT at home that
does, in some sense, far more than his $75,000 3B2 system does at work, from
his point of view at least. Specifically, he has no way of doing simple
calculations or spreadsheet-style work on the 3B2--as far as he has been able
to determine, no such software exists for his platform. For that matter, no
"productivity" software of any kind seems to exist, so he must be satisfied
either with bare shell UNIX or with hand-holding menu systems that don't even
allow him to send mail.
Does anyone know of any software that will allow simple calculation
capabilities WITH A NATURAL USER-INTERFACE on an AT&T 3B2? (of course,
natural is in the eye of the beholder, but SideKick's calculator is the
thing he has in mind). A spreadsheet would be even better ...
-- Fritz Ruehr
kfr@dip.eecs.umich.edupeter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) (10/30/90)
I never did understand this fascination with "calculator emulators". It makes no sense to draw a dinky little keypad on the screen when you have a perfectly good keyboard right in front of you. I mean, calculators are becoming closer and closer to handling standard computer expression syntax anyway... because it's friendlier. Why step backwards to a more hostile environment when you have "bc" shipped with UNIX? -- Peter da Silva. `-_-' +1 713 274 5180. 'U` peter@ferranti.com
jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu (Jay Maynard) (10/30/90)
In article <E6R6K6C@xds13.ferranti.com> peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes: >I never did understand this fascination with "calculator emulators". It makes >no sense to draw a dinky little keypad on the screen when you have a perfectly >good keyboard right in front of you. I mean, calculators are becoming closer >and closer to handling standard computer expression syntax anyway... because >it's friendlier. Why step backwards to a more hostile environment when you >have "bc" shipped with UNIX? bc is much less user-friendly than, say, an HP-16C...or the rpn program that emulates it (albeit incompletely) for Unix. I have to wrestle bc to get an answer out of it, but I can get answers out of a 16C without having to think about it...kinda like WordStar. -- Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu | adequately be explained by stupidity. "With design like this, who needs bugs?" - Boyd Roberts