Google Calculator

It just gets better and better...

Virtually unnoticed with all the Sobig’s and Blaster's whizzing around an amazing bit of functionality has been added to Google, the Google calculator. You can read google’s wholly inadequate documentation here but it is much more useful than described.

First off it has a great input parser letting you mix mathematic and English expressions at will. (Great for us stream of consciousness types)

So… 5 + 9 / 7 and 5 plus 9 divided by 7 and 5 + 9 divided by 7 all give the same result.

In addition to basic arithmetic operations it has full scientific calculator functions. It also has a large number of constants and conversions (again the documentation does not give any detail as to what is included) giving a great amount of everyday, and not so everyday, functionality.

teaspoons in 1/2 gallon

cups in 2 liters

normal body temperature in fahrenheit

1 year - (28 weeks plus 28 days) in months

1/2 mile * 1/2 mile in acres

mass of the sun / mass of the earth

carats per ounce

0b101011 * 0xEA in octal - In case this isn’t clear I’m taking the Binary number 101011 (base 2) multiplying it by the Hexadecimal number EA (base 16) and displaying the number as Octal (base 8)

e^(i pi)+1 - Don't ask, but trust me I was impressed.

In addition to everyday useful constants and conversions it has a bunch of arcane and bizarre things hidden away inside. Such as…

55 mph in furlongs per fortnight

23 fathoms in rods

light year / Astronomical Unit

1967 in roman

4 pecks in bushels

one parsec in smoots - (a smoot is an MIT based unit of measurement)

answer to life the universe and everything

Another interesting point to make is that it appears that Google is adding functionality to the calculator. I read an old posting listing failed attempts and found that the once failed radius of the moon now works fine. Some things I would like to see added include.

Monetary conversions (How may Yen to the dollar? I know these are not constants but how hard would it be to pull up the current exchange rates for the conversion?)

Business Math (compound interest rates and the like)

hogsheads

barrels

a stones throw

The Ear (I don't understand how you can have a smoot without having an ear...)