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WolframAlpha search engine

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 ericoides 16 May 2009
Anyone used this engine with success?

As a trial I asked it "why is the sun hot?" and "what are Caesar's dates?" and it told me "WolframAlpha isn't sure what to do with your input."

I must be doing it wrong. Channel 4 news had a feature about it last night and it looked quite promising, a rival to Google.

http://www.wolframalpha.com/
 nz Cragrat 16 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

No, it is not seen as a rival to google.

It's clearly going to be a useful tool, rather than a search engine -- as Wolfram says, "we're trying to compute things -- and I can imagine using it. But I can't see it replacing Google for all day use, and any "Google killer" talk seems way over the top. On the other hand, this is just the beginning. guardian.co.uk
OP ericoides 16 May 2009
In reply to nz Cragrat:

Ah, I see. C4 news was positioning it as a Google-killer. Anything for a bit of news.
 Trangia 16 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:
> Anyone used this engine with success?
>
> As a trial I asked it "why is the sun hot?"

I am not suprised. What a bloody stupid question coming from someone living in Britain. You can't expect a search engine to live in a fantasy world........
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Trangia:

er?

In reply to nzc: A report just now on 5Live claims that it both will and will not be a competitor to Google.
Chris Tan Ver. LI - On the Bog 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

On Radio 4 this morning...

Reporter to John Humphries - ask it any question that involves numbers

John Humphries ( thinks for a bit then goes): Is the population of sparrows growing faster than the population of haddocks?

Reporter - STUMPED!!

OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Chris Tan Ver. LI - On the Bog:

He's a tricky one isn't he?

I was just thinking what search engine I used before Google, eg on Mosaic, and can't remember. Perhaps it was Yahoo?
 Mart B 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

I just saw it on BBC News, what a great way to find info for my imminent exam. WolframAlpha didnt know what to do with any of my queries including "energy efficiency", and i thought that one was pretty easy.

Ill be sticking to wikipedia for the time being.
 saggers 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

WolframAlpha doesn't provide links and therefore cannot be a rival to google. In some respects it is more of a rival to wikipedia...

Try asking it questions such as:

Hello
What is your name
How are you
How old are you
Footyfan4 18 May 2009
In reply to Mart B:

You have to ask it direct questions, so 'how can energy efficiency be calculated?' might be better.

It gives answers to questions you ask (as I undertand it) rather than links to places to find the answers.

I think it could become very useful, it doesn't seem up to much at the moment though.
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Footyfan4:
> it doesn't seem up to much at the moment though.

I just asked it "What is the point?" and it gave me the equation x = x_0,y = y_0 (so it's got a sense of humour).

Trying to push it to its limits, I then asked "Where is Lewisham?" and it directed me to Picardy in France. If only ...
 Dan_S 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

It didn't know whether 3 Pebble slab is E1 or HVS either.....
Footyfan4 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

I don't get the joke...
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Footyfan4:

It's more a visual joke. Type the question in and you will see (don't ask me what the equation means, I don't understand maths).
 Nic 18 May 2009
In reply to Glen:

It's a bit faster than Deep Thought too - this took about a second:

http://www96.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=what+is+the+meaning+of+life%3F
 flaneur 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

> ...(so it's got a sense of humour).

http://www71.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=does+god+exist%3F

I wonder how long I'll have to wait for notification?

Anonymous 18 May 2009
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Anonymous:

I think you need to explain why you asked it that question in the first place (if you did).
Anonymous 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides: ht...
 Boogs 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

An incidental really but are you aware of www.scroogle.org & scroogle scraper its very useful if you dont want you know who tracking your online antics . .( not that I'm suggesting anyone has anything to hide of course ) . . there are numerous other search engines out there by the way , you just need to know where to look . .
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Anonymous:

Jolly interesting, but you haven't answered my question.

To boogie man: I'm not, thanks for the link.
Anonymous 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:
> (In reply to Anonymous)
>
> I think you need to explain why you asked it that question in the first place

just trying to be topical..
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Anonymous:

stone, blood, get, trying
 Tom Valentine 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:
All I wanted was a list of cars with 5 cylinder engines. No can do.
 Mark Stevenson 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides: Some things work really well, but unfortunately it only seems to recognise the UK but not Wales so I've failed to get it to provide a list of all the mountains in Wales over 800m which I thought it might manage.

It's rather good at questions on population data though.
Anonymous 18 May 2009
In reply to Mark Stevenson: aye, it thinks wales is a village in england with max elevation of 331ft with a population of 5956..
http://www33.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=maximum+elevation+wales
OP ericoides 18 May 2009
In reply to Mark Stevenson:

Yes, likewise it thinks there are only 31 mountains in the Alps (and what an eccentric list); of these it correctly reckons the Dufourspitze the highest. What I like about wiki is that you can alter and add to it; I guess this is quite a different beast. But given that it gets much of its data from wiki, I wonder what is going wrong.
http://www17.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Alps
 ukphil 18 May 2009
In reply to ericoides

Lacks basic geographical knowledge outside the US:

http://www19.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=dorset
OP ericoides 19 May 2009
In reply to Anonymous:

Quite, it's the sun wot won it.
 'Hilda' 19 May 2009
In reply to ericoides:

Well it knows the answer to the only question that mankind has ever wanted to know.....

http://www33.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=what+is+the+meaning+of+the+universe
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