So Xyon and I were playing with the Windows calculator the other day and I brought up the fact that in scientific mode, there wasn’t a square root button, while on the other hand in standard mode, there was. The only way to do square root in scientific mode is to hit the x^y button and then punch in .5.
Anyway, I’d imagine that to do x^y (or x to the power of y), you would hit x followed by “^” followed by y followed by enter. However, Xyon tells me that “^” really means XOR in calculator. I’m like there must be some shortcut key (or hot key) to activate the power. Turns out, for the 1st time in history, when you right clicked something and clicked “What’s this?”, something useful actually got displayed.
We right clicked the x^y button and clicked “What’s this?” and it showed:
Computes x raised to the yth power. Use this button as a binary operator. For example, to find 2 raised to the 4th power, click 2 x^y 4 =, which equals 16.
To calculate the yth root of x use Inv+x^y.
Keyboard equivalent = Y
So according to this tooltip, to do square root of 49, I could hit 49 -> y -> .5 -> enter OR 49 -> i -> y -> 2 -> enter, which both will yield 7.
Here is the full list of keyboard shortcuts (from the help file):
Button: Key
%: %
(: (
): )
*: *
+: +
+/-: F9
–: –
.: . or ,
/: /
0-9: 0-9
1/x: r
=: ENTER
A-F: A-F
And: &
Ave: CTRL+A [average]
Backspace: BACKSPACE
Bin: F8 [binary]
Byte: F4
C: ESC
CE: DEL
cos: o [cosine]
Dat: INS [
Dec: F6 [decimal]
Degrees: F2
dms: m [degree-minute-second]
Dword: F2
Exp: x [exponent/scientific notation]
F-E: v [scientific notation toggle]
Grads: F4
Hex: F5 [hexadecimal]
Hyp: h [hyperbolic]
Int: ; [integer]
Inv: i [inverse]
ln: n [natural logarithm]
log: l [logarithm]
Lsh: < [left shift]
M+: CTRL+P
MC: CTRL+L
Mod: %
MR: CTRL+R
MS: CTRL+M
n!: ! [factorial]
Not: ~
Oct: F7 [octal]
Or: |(pipe)
pi: p
Qword: F12
Radians: F3
s: CTRL+D [standard deviation]
sin: s [sine]
sqrt: @ [square root]
Sta: CTRL+S [statistics]
Sum: CTRL+T
tan: t [tangent]
Word: F3
Xor: ^
x^2: @ [squared]
x^3: # [cubed]
x^y: y [raised to the power of]
Most are pretty intuitive. Others are somewhat obscure. One thing I did noticed was that @ was reused. In standard mode, it means square root. In scientific mode, it means squared. VERY BIG DIFFERENCE.
Random Crap:
Super Mario Snow Art (from Digg) – Some bored New Jersey college kids turned a snowy night into a kick ass piece of art. – Nic, Daniel, Garrett Ian, Daniel , Justin and Craig are engineering and computer science students at New Jersey Institute of Technology, so when they saw that mother nature was dropping some white stuff on the ground outside, they decided to construct a wonderfully nerdy shrine to their favorite Italian plumber. Apparently, they used a string grid to get it, right. We’re not quite sure what that means, but the result sure is cool.
Steampunk Keyboard Mod (from Digg) – My goal with this project was to build a retro keyboard that was fully functional and of a sufficient quality that it could be used everyday by a touch typist. In order to achieve this I chose a high quality (though widely available) keyboard as my starting point. This is an IBM Model M “Clicky” keyboard. They were made starting in the mid 1980’s and a version is still manufactured today. This particular keyboard was made in 1989 and shipped with and IBM PowerStation 530, a UNIX box the size of a kegerator.
Kanon – Shiori Cosplay (from 4chan) – thought it was really well done and she’s really cute. The 2nd image is the actual scene from the anime.
WoW: Best birthday cake evar (243KB of visual awesome inline) (from Digg) – My good friend makes kick-ass cakes as a hobby. Last year she started dating my old roomate who plays World of Warcraft a fair amount around his job; for christmas she aquired a “WoW stole my boyfriend” t-shirt. She is good-natured about his love of Warcraft, however, as shown by the birthday cake she made him three weeks ago. The birthday cake actually looks really neat.
Newspaper says it fell for fake Gucci ad – Some people will do anything to appear in the papers. But few have the audacity of a man in Switzerland, who conned one of the country’s biggest media companies into publishing a two-page ad he created of himself posing semi-naked beside a bottle of Gucci perfume. You can view the actual ad at adfreak.
Jealous husbands may face trial in court – Mexican men who display extreme jealousy or avoid sex with their wives could be tried in court and punished under a new law, the special prosecutor for crimes against women told a local newspaper on Friday. … Those who stop talking to their wives, avoid sex or try to convince suspicious spouses they are “crazy” even if they are caught red-handed having an affair, are guilty of indifference, she said. Men found guilty of jealousy or indifference could face up to five years in prison, the newspaper said. Mexico’s individual states will determine the punishments, it said. I wonder if there’s a similar law for women, where if they avoid having sex with their husband, to be tried and punished ;p