Calculator STOCK homework0
The name of the app I’m doing a critique of is the Calculator stock app.
.
It’s got the basic functionality of a simple calculator but not much more. Learning to use the calculator is basically intuitive. To get to a menu with a caret for power for exclamation for factorial, one simply presses menu. The keyboard doesn’t work the best, though, as the % button is assigned randomly (as well as to the % over 5; if the user presses R, the percent sign is shown).
Basic calculator functions are supported, but only the very basic. Imaginary numbers aren’t supported. The screen allows a user to input as many characters as he or she would want, which is somewhat dumb, because a person using a simple calculator isn’t going to be doing billion number calculations and isn’t going to need all the space. Also, addition is all done on one line instead of hitting (+) and then having a new number pop up when one types.
Some functionality doesn’t really make sense. After doing a calculation, there is a way to get back to the previous entered input but it’s not very intuitive and I couldn’t find a concrete way of doing this in my few minutes of playing around.
The app only exploits the basics of a mobile platform, i.e. the touchscreen. There isn’t much more one could do with this, however, shaking for erasing would be a nice feature.
I imagine there are other more advanced calculator apps out there but, seeing as I don’t have a smartphone, (or any android device), I can’t really test these.
There really was no stress testing for this app. Large calculations would lead to E notation and then the infinity sign being displayed (as seen in the first picture) .
Because this is a stock app, money doesn’t really play a role. However, I imagine that a more functional app from the store would cost money. There is no way to make a profit in the calculator unless you showed an ad on load or on close, so charging for an amazing calculator would be a good idea.
Really, I wouldn’t only use a calculator like this for finding out store prices or tips or anything. I would never use a calculator like this for serious math work, and I imagine that this app isn’t designed for serious math, anyways.
-Travis Bischel