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Google search's new basic calculator
- peterwiese 14y agowhere?
- DeepDuh 14y agoI don't get it either. Maybe only US IPs?
- fromhet 14y agoRed Swede reporting in: only get a usual search query
- rwmj 14y agoIt's working for me from the UK. I can't imagine why Google would want to geolocate this. Perhaps they've only partially rolled it out to some of their datacenters?
- grumblepeet 14y agoAs you say was probably a rollout lag. Working here in UK now.
- duplabe 14y agoWorks from Hungary.
- JadeNB 14y agoaristidb (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4308149 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4308149) reports that you have to be searching in English (which can be done manually with `hl=en`).
- lvh 14y ago% is percentage, not mod (with our without signs). Damn normals!
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- kappaloris 14y agowould be nice if you could use the keyboard
- danabramov 14y agoInteresting how Microsoft and Google have different ideas of how percentage key (%) should work. Relevant post by Raymond Chen: “How does the [Windows] calculator percent key work?” http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2008/01/10/7047497.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2008/01/10/70474... Implementing % button, Google chose an approach which is more mathematically sensible but arguably less obvious to users. For Google, 10% just an alias for 0.1. This means that if you want to calculate how much a dress with a price of $299 costs with a 20% discount, type in 299 + 299 × 20% Perhaps, this is exactly how you think % should work. Microsoft, however, chose to make “%” key more user-friendly, perhaps sacrificing some consistency. Windows calculator tries to use the last computed value as “the whole”. Therefore, 299 - 20% will give you how much a $299 dress costs with 20% discount, and 299 + 5% - 20% will help you calculate 5% tax before applying the discount. Sadly, Google thinks 500 + 1% = 500.01 which is really not that helpful.
- elisee 14y agoI just tested it and the percent key in the Google calculator doesn't work like the one described in the linked article. It really just divides by 100. 3 + 5% = 3 + 0.05 = 3.05
- danabramov 14y agoSorry, I just reworded my comment to make it more clear. This article is about Windows calculator and I'm comparing two different approaches. Google went with simple 10% = 0.1 here, like you say.
- scotty79 14y agoThe way Microsoft did it is the same way most physical calculators I've seen work.
- Spittie 14y agoI don't get it, if i try 500 + 1% on Google i get 505 http://sadpanda.us/images/1112074-RA9OURZ.png http://sadpanda.us/images/1112074-RA9OURZ.png
- MattBearman 14y agoWhat a complete load of shit. You have to actually click the numbers, you can't use your computer's keyboard. Google, I am disappoint.
- Kwpolska 14y agoDon’t forget that the preferred method to do calculations with google is to put them into the search box.
- elisee 14y agoYou can type your calculation as a google query and you'll get the result. This calculator is designed for people looking for a mouse- / touch-based UI.
- MattBearman 14y agoI'll admit that as I'm using my laptop touch devices didn't occur to me, just tried it on my phone and actually it works really well with touch. But when on a non-touch device, even if you click on the calculator, focus remains on the search input, that seems like a massive UX failure to me.
- djtriptych 14y agoSo given this new information, what percentage of a load of shit would you now say it is?
- MattBearman 14y agoI'd say it's now a 70% load of shit. Also, thanks for the epic comment, it's not often I actually laugh out loud on HN :D
- alphakappa 14y agoIt seems to be the correct UI choice - If you start typing, your input goes into the search field, and the calculator app is purely a mouse/touch application. Looks like a thoughtful UX choice.
- aristidb 14y agoLink that works for people with non-English Google: https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=calculator https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=calculator (The link is setting the language to English for just that search.)
- jacobr 14y agoThanks, I wonder why they would only enable this for English searches?
- Semaphor 14y agoThey always test new stuff on their English sites first.
- Semaphor 14y agoha, I wondered why I got the old interface when my normal searches give me the new one;) I have chrome set to go to the English site;) Thanks.
- gnyman 14y agothanks, I tried to double check that the url would work for everyone but did not think about the automatic redirect to local the local google
- b0 14y agoNo accumulator register. You have to click the keys. Reasonable evaluator. Avoids Javascript 0.1 * 0.2 float issues. I'll stick with my 17 year old TI-92 though.
- JosephHatfield 14y agoBah, humbug! If it's not RPN, it's crap! :)
- gaving 14y agoInteresting, works for:- http://www.google.com/search?q=9/10 http://www.google.com/search?q=9/10 But not:- http://www.google.com/search?q=9/11 http://www.google.com/search?q=9/11 Also seems like it could be much smaller, since it's following this increasing trend to devote less and less screen real-estate to search results.
- TeMPOraL 14y agoMy guess is 9/11 was if-ed out; if someone types that into a query, one most likely wants to see results related to WTC attack.
- rabidsnail 14y agoThey could have generalized that based on result CTR.
- pokoleo 14y agoNot sure what a result CTR is - can you explain (click through rate?)
- rabidsnail 14y agoYes, click-through rate. If an unusually large percentage of users click on a result instead of engaging with the calculator then the calculator probably shouldn't be there.
- djtriptych 14y agoYou can force a calculator result with an equals sign: http://www.google.com/search?q=9/11= http://www.google.com/search?q=9/11=
- gburt 14y agoThis is Google trying to outsmart you. It thinks you're searching for Sept. 11 if you type 9/11. It happens quite regularly with other queries, add a = sign to force the calculator.
- jwilliams 14y agoI noticed there is also a new visual interface for unit conversions. e.g. https://www.google.com/search?q=1kg%20in%20lbs https://www.google.com/search?q=1kg%20in%20lbs
- mitakas 14y agoAnd then, there are units and bc.
- acomjean 14y agothe often forgotten unix, linux command line calculators I use all the time. bc -l or for those who like rpn dc
- cynusx 14y agoI just fire up irb these days
- ilija139 14y agoI just use spotlight
- gaving 14y agobuiltin zcalc's good if you're a zsh user:- seth:~% which calc calc: aliased to noglob zcalc seth:~% calc ((8*8)/8)*8 64
- djtriptych 14y agopython -i :)
- ck2 14y agoUnfortunately if you use google without javascript this is a pain as it does not fall back to the inline calculator. If anyone knows or figures out a url option to make it do the old inline math, please let me know ?
- damoncali 14y agoAlso cool: In Chrome, type "0xff in decimal" in the address bar. "=255" appears as one of the suggested searches.
- shrikant 14y agoThis happens for basic calculation really, for which Google spits out an answer. And since it's a feature of Google Suggest, it also works in Firefox.
- herrturtur 14y agoThat's pretty cool. The only thing I'd change is to make it clearer that the top left button switches between rad and deg.
- webmonkeyuk 14y agoYour submission seems to be doing better than mine from earlier in the week http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4295093 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4295093
- scottfr 14y agoShameless plug: I would like you to check out the calculator I built: http://herocalc.com http://herocalc.com It's pure Javascript, has a full parser/tree-builder to process equations, allows you to define functions and variables, and is very fast. It also installs a search handler so you can do calculations from your search bar.
- AstroJetson 14y agoSo 299+5% and/or 299+(5%) to figure the sales tax does not work at all, it just says "Your equation has an error. Please correct it." and no hint to what the error is. Sorry, not ready for prime time
- ubershmekel 14y agoI'm holding my breath for "stopwatch".
- sodelate 14y agogoogle is not just a search engine
- madrona 14y agoI bet they are doing this to collect data on my favorite numbers! Don't bubble my calculations, Google!
- bakhlawa 14y agoI couldn't help but wonder how much traffic is lost by online-calculator.com, the first search result...
- imrehg 14y agoThere's also graphical calculator, or is that not a new thing? I don't remember seeing it before. For example: http://goo.gl/uSSWW http://goo.gl/uSSWW
- gojomo 14y agoMeanwhile, Bing still doesn't do rate calculations that have worked at Google for years, like: 1GB / 1 hour 500km / 1.5 hours in mph
- georgemcbay 14y agoPretty cool, but why doesn't pressing equal again repeat the last step? Eg. on any decent calculator if you press: 2, x, 2, = You get 4. Press = again, you get 8, and so on. As insignificant as this may seem, lack of this in a calculator is a complete showstopper problem for me.
- yumraj 14y ago9^9^9 = Infinity and 9^9^9^9 gives Error :)