The Californer - Battle For The Blackboard: Arithmetic Says Algebra Is Completely Factored Up For Too Many Students And Too Many Adults

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Long relegated to elementary schools, Arithmetic believes it's ready to take on tasks for the tens of millions nobody bothers with. Current spreadsheets all worship algebra. According to Arithmetic, there's another way to calculate stuff that's been hiding in plain sight and works cool as a cucumber.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - Californer -- Let's see how T/Maker software does math in a way never seen before. Imagine a giant calculator with tons of crazy buttons sitting on top of green and white boxes in two dimensions. Type whatever text and numbers you want in the white cells. "Calculation Trails" will go in the green cells. Each trail would have a series of steps executed in number order. Each step would seem like a sequence of buttons touched on the calculator. Most entries would consist of an operator and an associated value (aka the operand). There are a number of ways to designate the operand (see image). Enjoying T/Maker involves learning to easily read the operator/operand combinations. Note: The exclamation point operator enters the operand into T/Maker's calculator.

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"Functions" replace the value in the calculator with some derivation from it (sqr is square root). "Special" functions mostly require multiple parameters. By convention the parameters are placed in fixed name memories. "Flow Control" allows impromptu exits from or restarts of various calculations. A "When" clause describes a conditional test so different situations can be handled by different calculations. T/Maker's calculator is completely programmable and useable to create simulations, perform binary searches, etcetera. It can be a platform to explain complicated subjects more understandably. Even so, providing a way to do daily life bookkeeping and calculations to support informed decision-making is Goal #1.

The video linked below demonstrates using T/Maker in real time. A tool called the Debugger is explained. It can walk operator by operator through calculations. It's a godsend for discovering mistakes and building confidence that your masterpiece is error-free. This is only possible because T/Maker executes each step left to right. A tale of the long history of this effort is on the YouTube page as well as the T/Maker website..

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Note: I am not looking at this from the perspective of any financial gain. My hope is this approach can outlive me and have the resources behind it to be improved and made available to most everyone. That likelihood is slim, but I'm giving it my best shot.

YouTube often plays this video too small to read easily. The first link below will play the video on your default media player.

Directly from the website: http://www.tmaker.site/_valla.mp4

From YouTube (link preferred over red arrow below): https://youtu.be/02n0W_HEn18

Website: http://tmaker.site

Contact
Peter Roizen
roizen@ix.netcom.com

Source: WildWords Game Company

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