OT Don't read if you sre very very easily offended.

Unices have 'units' - but recently someone in another newsgroup shared a link to this free units conversion gem for Windows:

I keep hoping to see units incorporated into calculators, but that may be asking too much...

Google does conversions nicely. Google "100 furlongs per fortnight in cubits per decade" for example.

Could be a long wait. There are so many possible choices of units that covering the general engineering case could make for a very complicated input system. Especially if you try to incorporate derived units beyond basic Force and Length measurements. If/when it happens it'll probably appear first for very specialized applications. Even then, somebody would probably be flaming it because it didn't offer a choice to enter stress or pressure in Stones per Square Cubit or something equally obtuse.

A hand held calculator that could handle calculations with a mix of common units would be nice. Of course, if we all went completely to SI units for everything, it would make things simpler. But a lot of folks, including me, have a hard time giving up pounds, gallons, feet, inches, yards, miles, etc. Depends on what you're accustomed to and comfortable with. I can visualize 1/2 inch more readily than 12.5 mm even though a millimeter is as convenient and useful a measurement in woodworking as 1/16 inch. Likewise, 1 HP means more to me than does

Interesting that in the English/Imperial system, historically at least, Force (pound) is basic and Mass (slug or poundal) is derived while in the SI systems, CGS or MKS, Mass (gram or kilogram) is basic and Force (dyne or Newton) is derived.

Tom Veatch Wichita, KS USA

I'm reminded of my first day in physics class when the prof announced, "Lady and gentlemen (My class contained the first women in engineering school that year. My how times have changed), I will be giving several exams through out the quarter.

The answer to every question asked by these exams will be "1" along with the appropriate units".

Your job will be to define the 'appropriate units'.

Lew

Probably so. I recently wrote a software simulator to model the fluidyne engines I've been working on. I struggled with units and finally decided to allow all the units I might want to use. For example, temperatures can be suffixed with C, F, or K - with K as the default. The input routine converts C and F values to K and ensures that the result isn't negative before passing it to the application. For pressure, length, area, volume, and temperature (what I was working with as inputs) it's a nice convenience.

It is interesting, and I'd be inclined to guess that this has to do with what people felt comfortable with when faced with the task of setting up reproducible standards...

Morris Dovey wrote in news:49e0a310$0$48226$ snipped-for-privacy@news.qwest.net:

The TI-89 Titanium can do units. It can also do calculus if you're so inclined. It does both Physics (metric) units and the normal stuff (US standard).

One thing you learn is to overdo the parenthesis especially around units.

Puckdropper

I like that! Next time in an electronics emporium, I'm gonna ask 'em to unwrap one for me to fondle. :)

That is neat! Can it accept and manipulate fractional inch inputs - like 5 equal spaces in 11 3/32 inches = 2 7/32

Tom Veatch Wichita, KS USA

There's the story about the engineer and the mathematician, who both know how to drink from a cup, being confronted by a water fountain.

The engineer studies the problem for a moment, bends over, and has a nice refreshing drink. The mathematician studies the problem and fills his cup.

The different solutions come from their training: The engineer is taught to solve new problems directly, while the the mathematician is taught to reduce new problems to ones that have already been solved.

Some of us rely on memory-aides:

"A pint's a pound, the world around," or "there's pi seconds in a picocentury."

Tom Veatch wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Yes, but it's not intuitive. Your proper fraction 11 3/32 has to be entered as "11+3/32" and the command is (11+3/32)/5 = 71/32, or to get your 2 7/32, you'd enter propFrac((11+3/32)/5).

I can't figure out how to get the propFrac function to work with units. It appears unitary conversion is done after propFrac does its work, so you get the result of the unitary conversion. (Either an improper fraction or decimal result.)

Puckdropper

Still that's better than the way I have to do it with my current TI-whatever. I can do the (11+3/32)/5 part but it comes out as 2.21875 which is OK if the decimal part is recognizable as one of the "standard" fractions. If not it's (ans-int(ans))*32 and round to the nearest integer.

Now if I can just convince myself that (plus all the other stuff it can do) is worth circa $150 to me.

Tom Veatch Wichita, KS USA

The Google search web site

For example try the following 'search string': 1.2 km to inches The first response is: 1.2 kilometers = 47 244.0945 inches

Second example: search string: 1 K to F response: 1 kelvin = -457.87 degrees Fahrenheit

Dan

Actually, there are (roughly) pi seconds in a nanocentury.

todd

Tom Veatch wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

If all you're doing is messing with fractions, there are woodworking calculators available for around $20. A TI-80 can handle fractions quite well, too, and should be available used for about the same price.

If you're constantly doing unitary conversions, the TI-89 is a godsend!

Puckdropper

Oh. Good thing I never had an occasion to use that conversion.