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Re: Thoughts on a Wolfram|Alpha package for

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg101898] Re: [mg101856] Thoughts on a Wolfram|Alpha package for
  • From: Andrzej Kozlowski <akozlowski at gmail.com>
  • Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:52:42 -0400 (EDT)
  • References: <200907200959.FAA28232@smc.vnet.net>

Well, to me it all seems to me a little premature...

Personally I am not at all sure what the advantages of access to  
Wolfram Alpha from Mathematica are supposed to be. Obviously they  
can't lie primarily in the sort of things that Mathematica can do  
alone and also not in those things that can be done by combining  
Mathematica with Google. What lies outside this range is intriguing  
but still far from clear, as so ably demonstrated in the video the  
link to which was recently posted by magma:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvngZAx1-PU&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.wolframalpha.com%2F&feature=player_embedded

At this stage I can't see many people committing themselves to buying  
something that would enable them to get no results much more  
conveniently and efficiently than they can (or rather can't) do with a  
browser.  But one day, who knows...

(However, not to discourage others I would like to note that I am a  
well known diehard reactionary.)

Andrzej Kozlowski

On 20 Jul 2009, at 02:59, David Reiss wrote:

> In a day a while ago I put together the Wolfram|Alpha lookup tool for
> Mathematica which quite a few folks have downloaded and are using:
>
> http://www.scientificarts.com/mathematicatools/blog/BE3451431867/BE3451431867.html
>
> There is certainly much more that I could build to make use of  
> Wolfram|
> Alpha in Mathematica and to interface with it from Mathematica.  But
> the problem or me is the cost of my time....   Alas, it's a rare
> resource.  I suspect that spending the time to build such a package
> wouldn't pay for itself either at a fixed inexpensive) cost (say$20
> per license) or as "donation ware" at that rate.
>
> What are peoples thoughts as to
>
>
> 1) what you'd like to see in it
> 2) would you buy it
>
> My general model for building something like this would be to create
> an initial base functionality and then to add to it (at no incremental
> cost to paid users for new versions just  as I do with
> http://scientificarts.com/worklife)
>
> Sadly 3rd party application for Mathematica sell very poorly--rarely
> even beginning to recoup the cost to develop them.  But I could do
> this if there were a couple of hundred users willing to purchase it.
>
> So, just thinking out loud...
>
> Your opinions....  is it worth it?  I suspect not...
>
> --David
> http://scientificarts.com/worklife)
>



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