World: r3wp

It seems beside the point that AIR/Flex/etc/whatever is built on 
XML, JS, and so on.  If the end product is better and the development 
isn't too much more painful - developers/braintrust are going to 
go with the better end product.

Re. Twitter, there's much depth and nuance to their 'simple' concept...

Now we can   compare Apple AppStore to MS Marketplace. I think MS 
is introducing the same limitations for devs, no? - http://developer.windowsmobile.com/resources/en-us/MarketplaceProhibitedApplicationTypes.pdf

Amongst the prohibited apps are - "Applications that run code outside 
Microsoft runtimes (native, managed, and widgets)" - so no REBOL 
once again via the marketplace?

http://www.wavemaker.com/product/screencasts.html...open source 
java ide for building web sites incorporating REST/SOAP etc

the way I see it, pekr, it simply means you have to compile using 
MS compilers, so you can't use GCC

For those that didn't notice, Wolfram Alpha has been online for a 
couple of days:

http://www17.wolframalpha.com/

I don't think it's going to change the world in a hurry.

I've noticed that a lot of people are using it wrong. You can't ask 
a calculator where all the good porn is.

lol

but you can probably ask it where the volume of some interesting 
physical attributes are the highest?

Yesterday I discussed with my mom, whether the Earth's volume really 
is 50 times that of the Moon. Googling that doesn't give a precise 
answer, but typing "volume of the earth divided by the volume of 
the moon" gives an exact answer.

I tried maths and genetics:
   how many beans make five?
   har1

Google is still ahead for both those queries. So some work needed 
yet.

maxim, ask it what the highest point in Canada is.

I often talk to my spouse about the volume of the moon.

man I'm  ssssooooooo resisting sending some line with what you just 
wrote... hahahah

hmm... your keyboard and Steeve's has the same problem.

henrik, you are right,... when asked "where is the best porn"  it 
really doesn' know what to say...  ;-)

it doesn't even know what boobies are!

ask it what the volume of a D cup is ...

hhahaha

it's a computational engine ... not a search engine.

well it knows about a lot of stuff, its just a processing system. 
 you get definitive answers for alot of "Who is xxxx" for example.

its *not* just

It doesn't know about D but it does know about T

so, what does it really process?


in what ways does it fair better than regular search engine...? (pardon 
my ignorance here)

needs a lot of human input

well, give a sequence from the human genome ... and see what happens

and it really isnt a search engine. it doesn't refer to things, it 
gives them to you directly.

Its back end are absolute data, statistics and facts and all data 
is stored internally. it doesn't scour the web for information. I 
believe also it's engine is written in Mathematica.

it's basically a really fancy calculator.

I'll wait for the wolframbeta

for example "what is e"  give a lot of info... it even returns the 
codepoint for 2 encodings, and suggests that e is also part of math 
(with a hot link to it)

henrik it does scour the web... it integrated data within itself, 
using complex algorythms to find patterns and stuff.

that is what I read the first time I looked into it anyways

ok...here's something I tried...

A comparison between RIMM, AAPL and PALM
http://www17.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=RIMM%2C+AAPL%2C+PALM


But, doubt it will be useful...since history shows that we can't 
rely on modelling alone when it comes to the stock market (or any 
market)

From the FAQ:

Is Wolfram|Alpha a search engine?

No. It's a computational knowledge engine: it generates output by 
doing computations from its own internal knowledge base, instead 
of searching the web and returning links.

Does Wolfram|Alpha get its data from the web?

No. It comes from Wolfram|Alpha's internal knowledge base. Some of 
the data in that knowledge base is derived from official public or 
private websites, but most of it is from more systematic primary 
sources.

Where does Wolfram|Alpha's data come from?

Many different sources, combined and curated by the Wolfram|Alpha 
team. At the bottom of each relevant results page there's a "Source 
information" button, which provides background sources and references.

by using it a bit I realise that its not using very fancy NLP for 
the questions.

yes, some questions fail, even if they should make logical sense.

sometimes changing what, where or who gives the same replies, when 
they should be different.. so its probably using basic statistical 
based analysis, which doesn't understand the concepts.... where as 
current nlp systems really do understand the differences between 
places people and things.

It needs to loosen up a bit too:
   largest prime  ===> good answer
   smallest prime ===> confused wolfram

perhaps the people who coded it assumed that the persons asking the 
questions have the ability to understand the answers?

So, try and deal with the hard questions first and leave the easy 
stuff to google

I guess you should compare Wolfram Alpha to Spock in the beginning 
of the fourth Star Trek movie, where he's being tested by a computer. 
"How do you feel?" :-)

They should in fact just call it "Ask Mr. Spock".

You're not going to ruin the movie for us are you???

Not the new one. :-)

Gene Roddenbury or his estate executors might object ...

I can see why Carl says it's his favourite Star Trek movie. The computers 
that Spock uses are in fact Amiga 1000s. :-)

aw geez .. spoilers :(