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Test Driving the Wolfram Alpha

Posted by kdawson on from the know-what-i-know-if-you-know-what-i-mean dept.

SilverMind writes in to note a blog entry at Byte Size Biology describing in detail a few hours spent with Wolfram Alpha (which we have discussed before). "After playing around with Wolfram Alpha for a few hours, I can safely say the following: it's different, it's incomplete, it's idiosyncratic, and it's funky cool. And no, it will not dethrone Google, nor does it aim to do so."

25 of 124 comments (clear)

  1. Needs a better name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    How the hell am I supposed to "Wolfram Alpha" something? No one will ever say that.

    1. Re:Needs a better name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      A suitable portmanteau may emerge. Wolfa? Walpha? Wralph?

    2. Re:Needs a better name by Lemmy+Caution · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Ralph."

      E.g., "can you tell me the names of the original members of the Bay City Rollers?" "Ralph it for yourself."

    3. Re:Needs a better name by Ilgaz · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Can you say "Observables for the Analysis of Event Shapes in e+ e- Annihilation and Other Processes" without taking a breath? Mr. Wolfram can :)

      Seriously, that is not a general search engine or even engine as we understand today. It is something else. It is the click happy IT media which compares it to Google and I am sure people at Wolfram research either laughs or cries because of it.

    4. Re:Needs a better name by joss · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Ah ffs, what the hell do you think a 'general search engine' is ? Google's algorithms are seriously complicated too. I'll pretty much guarantee you Google use, or at very least have experimented with an algorithm which does very very close approximation to 'analysis of event shapes in e+ and e- annihilation' except it was implemented to run in scalable way on finite hardware. Also, quite aside from all that, why the hell wouldn't one compare it to google when people would be using it for the exact same purpose.

      Without *actual* AI, their goal is completely impossible and their results will include millions of weird artifacts [or 'bugs' as far as users are concerned], so I predict that even in their chosen sub-domain, people will soon get frustrated and confused and return to Google.

      --
      http://rareformnewmedia.com/
    5. Re:Needs a better name by Bakkster · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Also, quite aside from all that, why the hell wouldn't one compare it to google when people would be using it for the exact same purpose.

      People might use Wikipedia for the same purpose as Google, that doesn't mean we should compare them. The people who expect every Google search to work in Alpha are wrong. Those who expect genetic, scientific, or mathematical comparisons to work in Google as it is now are equally wrong. Hell, Alpha doesn't even search the internet, it has its own information database.

      How are the two comparable again?

      --
      Write your representatives! Repeal the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics!
  2. Video of Alpha in action by MBCook · · Score: 4, Informative

    There is a video called A Sneak Preview of Wolfram|Alpha on YouTube that seems to have been filmed at a talk Wolfram gave. After watching it I think I have a decent idea of what it's like to use, and just how very different it is from every other search out there. I can't wait to try it.

    And to see what happens when you search for "Rick Astley".

    I'd also like to see if it can convert things like 1 GB into Libraries of Congress. Google's unit conversion doesn't include the LOC, sadly.

    --
    Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
    1. Re:Video of Alpha in action by tromtone · · Score: 5, Informative
      I have preview access and just tried it.

      Like other singers, it lists his full name, date of birth, place of birth, and a timeline of his life. There are no events on the timeline, and it extends all the way until 2010, so apparently he's at least got one more year to try to top Never Gonna Give You Up.

      By the way, here's a screen capture video of me putting this search into Wolfram Alpha.

    2. Re:Video of Alpha in action by Hurricane78 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Use Qalculate!, and define your own units. :)

      Oh, and remember to define "B" as byte and "b" as bit, or you might end up with somethingsomething megabarns of memory. ^^

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
    3. Re:Video of Alpha in action by Ragzouken · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Is there a reason you restricted your screen capture video to certain countries?

    4. Re:Video of Alpha in action by operator_error · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Recently in the New York Times, there is an article about how YouTube is segmenting its reach, because it is expensive to stream their media to developing nations, that fail to return costs back to Yahoo in the form of advertising rates/revenue.

      "In Developing Countries, Web Grows Without Profit"
      http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/technology/start-ups/27global.html

    5. Re:Video of Alpha in action by abundance · · Score: 3, Funny

      I'm from Italy and I can report that youtube has not yet implemented rickroll protection for my country

  3. AI exercise? by moon3 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Understanding written sentences and answering them by using logical cognition is part of what successful AI has to achieve..

    Something that Wolfram might not directly telling you.

  4. Who came up with "Google Killer"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I am really getting sick of it. People who has no clue about what they write, adds cheap titles like "Google Killer" to every innovation in search, "iPhone killer" to mobile app/os/device etc.

    It doesn't do any good to the service/device/software mentioned. It just guarantees the huge amount of people will be "free astroturfers" for Google/Apple etc. spreading jokes about the product no matter how good it is or how much potential it has.

    No, you can't "kill" Google by simply inventing something and I don't believe a scientist run company has such stupid ideas in mind.

  5. finally by suricatta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Maybe we can get the difinitive answer for the meaning of life? :)

  6. Which Wolfram Alpha by russotto · · Score: 4, Funny

    Is it Wolfram Alpha V, or Wolfram Alpha VI? That's vitally important!

    1. Re:Which Wolfram Alpha by h4rdc0d3 · · Score: 5, Funny

      It is a reference to a pair of planets named in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - Seti Alpha V and Seti Alpha VI.

      I won't explain any more in case you have not seen the movie, though if you haven't, what are you doing in here? How did you get past security? ;)

  7. Not A Search Engine by RoFLKOPTr · · Score: 5, Informative

    For those of you who aren't gonna RTFA, I would like to reiterate something that is stated in TFA, because it seems, from reading comments on previous articles about Wolfram|Alpha, that people think this is a search engine and is trying to compete with the likes of Google and whatnot. I also get this from a couple articles from various tech sites that I've read who search for... things... on W|A and compare the results to Google and claim that Google is superior.

    People, W|A is not a search engine in the conventional sense. It is more of a knowledgebase. It is a computational engine. Rather than finding websites that tell you about what you're trying to learn about, W|A gives you the information you're looking for on their site, pulled from a large 20-someodd-year-old database of verified scientific facts that began with Wolfram Mathematica. If the info you're looking for isn't directly present in the database, W|A will compute it for you if it has the necessary data dependencies. W|A is not the same as Google and is not trying to compete with Google, so to those of please stop trying to pass off side-by-side comparisons between W|A and Google as journalism. That's not to say, though, that Google won't try to buy them out or even start up their own academic knowledgebase to compete with Wolfram... and yes, that would be Google entering Wolfram's domain, not the other way around. [/rant]

    Anyways, I think W|A looks awesome and I will surely poke around when it launches on May 18 (I think... correct me if I'm wrong please).

    1. Re:Not A Search Engine by Hurricane78 · · Score: 4, Funny

      For those of you who aren't gonna RTFA, I would like to...

      tl;dr. ;)

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
  8. What's the point? by glwtta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Am I the only one getting a little sick of all these "Oh look there's so much buzz around Wolfram Alpha! Really, you are all very excited about it!" previews/sneak-peeks/tidbits/etc?

    Until I can actual use it, I have exactly zero interest in this thing. Is there really any reason to propagate the marketing drivel?

    --
    sic transit gloria mundi
  9. Alpha? by Znooptree · · Score: 5, Funny

    When Google get their hands on this, it will be Wolfram Beta forever.

    1. Re:Alpha? by jonaskoelker · · Score: 3, Insightful

      When Google get their hands on this, it will be Wolfram Beta Forever.

      But things with "Forever" in their name never ship!

  10. Re:What a giant viral marketing campain... by ailnlv · · Score: 3, Informative

    According to wikipedia, its supposed to go public on the 18th. That's a bit more than a week and a lot less than half a century.

  11. Ruby does this already... by jonaskoelker · · Score: 4, Funny

    Ruby can do this already:

    $ echo 'printf("%d\n", (6*9).to_s(13));' | ruby

  12. Update by wjousts · · Score: 3, Interesting

    BTW, there was an update to the previous Wolfram Alpha vs Google post here. The author tried some of the searches suggested by Slashdot readers.