Wednesday, 14 September 2011

soft question - Math keyboard: does it exist ?

For the record, I do NOT find this question off-topic.



Math is moving away from the pen and paper (or chalk and chalkboard) days. Computers are everywhere, and, unlike days of old when computers were notoriously BAD at math, modern languages, such as Python, have built in representations of fractions, complex numbers, positive and negative infinity, etc.



Matrices and vectors, for example, are used in everything from the latest shoot-em-up to bank transactions, to simulation software and drawing programs.



It is about time that we had a real solution for entering and working with real equations on a computer, rather than having to slog it out with --> area = (PI * (r^2)).



Would I buy a keyboard that had all the standard mathematical symbols built into it?



Absolutely.



And while, yes, I am aware that I can remap a standard keyboard, and while yes, I touch type... some of these symbols would be used often enough to want on the keyboard, yet rarely enough to have no idea where you put them. (Where the %&@# did I put phi? CTRL-P? Bah, PI... Alt P? Rho? Whats that doing there?)... a quick look down on the proper keyboard could solve this easily.



And yes... I came to this board after doing a Google search for just such a beast... if this question had not been asked here, I never would have wandered to your site.



Me

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