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In the meantime, they just released a screencast demo done by Stephen Wolfram. It seems to be getting lost in the other news of the day but its pretty cool. ht

In the meantime, they just released a screencast demo done by Stephen Wolfram. It seems to be getting lost in the other news of the day but its pretty cool. http://blog.wolframalpha.com/2009/05/13/stephen-wolframs-introduction-to-wolframalpha/ http://blog.wolframalpha.com/2009/05/13/stephen-wolframs-int...

martythemaniak 17y ago
After seeing that, I strongly suspect my browser will get a 3rd text box next go the google search.
gustavo_duarte 17y ago
Whoah! I've used Mathematica a lot and I had high expectations for Wolfram Alpha, but this... was just incredible. Thank you so much for posting it. I wonder if they'd consider opening the system up for others to develop 'plug-ins' covering more knowledge areas.
abstractbill 17y ago
That is some really amazing stuff. I can't wait to play with it myself.
ErrantX 17y ago
one thing that strikes me how can it logically say "the gdp of france / italy" should be interpreted as "the gdp of france divided by the gdp of Italy" that makes no sense to me.... clearly the context suggests that I want to know the GDP of both countries side by side. Actually im underwhelmed by it :( which is sad.
- gustavo_duarte 17y ago
  He mentions that simply putting items in a series would generate comparisons, so I think you'd get what you want by taking out the / operator. (edited, no need for "vs.", just series seems to do the trick)
- noodle 17y ago
  because it interprets "/" as mathematical division and "vs." as comparison. they chose to use some specific, static operators so that you can do interesting things with the data, instead of having it simplify your request to what you "probably" want.
  - ErrantX 17y ago
    how many non-mathematicl non techy people (who realistically might want data like this, say, for a school report) would use vs. rather than /. it's just not natural english. I understand your point: and I would have figured it out. But this is marketed as an everydfay search engine - which it's not, it's an advanced search for an encyclopedia :)
    - noodle 17y ago
      how many non-tech people would even assume that the search engine could produce this type of comparative results without learning about it first? in that process of learning, you learn how it works, and learn that /=division, vs=comparison i imagine if it turns out to be a common problem, they'll probably give you a little reminder message about it. "if you're looking for data comparison, use vs. instead of /"
      - fb 17y ago
        That little learning for technically literate (small percentage of users) could be a show stopper for the rest. Many people are scared of even the simple maths (sad but true).
    - programnature 17y ago
      Isn't it silly to judge a huge system by a single query which happened to to one logical thing instead of another?
- programnature 17y ago
  That is an interesting interpretation, though I think its correct to assume that you are trying to specify a computation rather than presentation. In general its best to thing of that input field as a API with a huge syntax space, rather than something that is actually "understanding" anything. Getting the side-by-side comparisons can be done in many ways, like just using a comma instead of /
  - ErrantX 17y ago
    my main point is that it is the "understanding" idea that WA is being presented as (either by Wolfram or the media I dont know). It obviously isnt: so people will get confused...
byrneseyeview 17y ago
So... at about 3:30, he enters "6000 words". One of the calculations is wrong (screenshot: http://byrneseyeview.tumblr.com/post/107322432/i-was-just-watching-the-wolfram-alpha-screencast http://byrneseyeview.tumblr.com/post/107322432/i-was-just-wa...). Am I missing something? Did the Mathematica inventor do a screencast with a multiplication error? Or is he using a video / mockup rather than an actual Alpha?
- nimbix 17y ago
  There are 5999 spaces between words. But that still leaves him 1 character short.
  - byrneseyeview 17y ago
    Unless, of course, he's assuming a 6000-word sentence with no punctuation except the period at the end.
ftse 17y ago
It looks incredible. I think Google are right to be concerned. Others should be too - take the mortgage example: it wouldn't be hard to integrate current deals on offer from mortgage providers. One query I'd like to build is a TCO for a particular model of car based on running cost, service cost and the probability I will die in a crash which obviously limits my future earnings.

martythemaniak 17y ago

After seeing that, I strongly suspect my browser will get a 3rd text box next go the google search.

gustavo_duarte 17y ago

Whoah! I've used Mathematica a lot and I had high expectations for Wolfram Alpha, but this... was just incredible. Thank you so much for posting it. I wonder if they'd consider opening the system up for others to develop 'plug-ins' covering more knowledge areas.

abstractbill 17y ago

That is some really amazing stuff. I can't wait to play with it myself.

ErrantX 17y ago

one thing that strikes me how can it logically say "the gdp of france / italy" should be interpreted as "the gdp of france divided by the gdp of Italy" that makes no sense to me.... clearly the context suggests that I want to know the GDP of both countries side by side. Actually im underwhelmed by it :( which is sad.

gustavo_duarte 17y ago
He mentions that simply putting items in a series would generate comparisons, so I think you'd get what you want by taking out the / operator. (edited, no need for "vs.", just series seems to do the trick)
noodle 17y ago
because it interprets "/" as mathematical division and "vs." as comparison. they chose to use some specific, static operators so that you can do interesting things with the data, instead of having it simplify your request to what you "probably" want.
- ErrantX 17y ago
  how many non-mathematicl non techy people (who realistically might want data like this, say, for a school report) would use vs. rather than /. it's just not natural english. I understand your point: and I would have figured it out. But this is marketed as an everydfay search engine - which it's not, it's an advanced search for an encyclopedia :)
  - noodle 17y ago
    how many non-tech people would even assume that the search engine could produce this type of comparative results without learning about it first? in that process of learning, you learn how it works, and learn that /=division, vs=comparison i imagine if it turns out to be a common problem, they'll probably give you a little reminder message about it. "if you're looking for data comparison, use vs. instead of /"
    - fb 17y ago
      That little learning for technically literate (small percentage of users) could be a show stopper for the rest. Many people are scared of even the simple maths (sad but true).
  - programnature 17y ago
    Isn't it silly to judge a huge system by a single query which happened to to one logical thing instead of another?
programnature 17y ago
That is an interesting interpretation, though I think its correct to assume that you are trying to specify a computation rather than presentation. In general its best to thing of that input field as a API with a huge syntax space, rather than something that is actually "understanding" anything. Getting the side-by-side comparisons can be done in many ways, like just using a comma instead of /
- ErrantX 17y ago
  my main point is that it is the "understanding" idea that WA is being presented as (either by Wolfram or the media I dont know). It obviously isnt: so people will get confused...

byrneseyeview 17y ago

So... at about 3:30, he enters "6000 words". One of the calculations is wrong (screenshot: http://byrneseyeview.tumblr.com/post/107322432/i-was-just-watching-the-wolfram-alpha-screencast http://byrneseyeview.tumblr.com/post/107322432/i-was-just-wa...). Am I missing something? Did the Mathematica inventor do a screencast with a multiplication error? Or is he using a video / mockup rather than an actual Alpha?

nimbix 17y ago
There are 5999 spaces between words. But that still leaves him 1 character short.
- byrneseyeview 17y ago
  Unless, of course, he's assuming a 6000-word sentence with no punctuation except the period at the end.

ftse 17y ago

It looks incredible. I think Google are right to be concerned. Others should be too - take the mortgage example: it wouldn't be hard to integrate current deals on offer from mortgage providers. One query I'd like to build is a TCO for a particular model of car based on running cost, service cost and the probability I will die in a crash which obviously limits my future earnings.