Hello everyone,
Today it is with great honor and pleasure that we are finally announcing the release of FormulaPro !
What is FormulaPro ?
- Here are the technical details : FormulaPro is a TI-Nspire (OS 3.x) document whose main content is a Lua script. Yep, all made in Nspire-Lua (http://www.inspired-lua.org). Indeed, it is the only way so far / right now to “properly” achieve what we do on FormulaPro (completely graphical UI, math calculations…).
- FormulaPro is also free, of course, and open-source (https://github.com/adriweb/
EEPro-for-Nspire/ ) (LGPL license) ! 🙂
Hmm ok, but what does it do ? 😛
- Well, here you go : some of you may already know what’s called “EEPro” or “MEPro” for the TI-89 and TI-92. It is an official program that TI puts in the 89 by default. If you don’t know it, EEPro-89 is basically a program described by TI like this: “This application solves the problems of electrical engineering. It is composed of three modules: Analysis, Equations (700 equations grouped into 16 subjects) and Reference. ” In short, a complete and very powerful application about Electrical Engineering. Well, FormulaPro is the 2nd part (“Equations”) of our project to port the EEPro-89 suite to the Nspire.
But we improved it, naturally. A lot. (And we already have plans and written code already ready for version 2.0 which will be even more awesome and more powerful.)
- What FormulaPro right now is capable of, along with its website, is :
- to be able to run on any OS 3.x and any Nspire model and to be able to run on the computer software too with auto-resizing frames
- Mouse and keyboard input support, on both Software and Handheld
- to be able to let users generate their own pack of equations, smartly (variables and units are bound), within categories and sub-categories,
- to be able to solve intelligently solve the equations it’s given, contrary to the 89 version, where the user had to select what equations had to be used : Indeed, here you just have to enter what you know already, and it will automatically try to solve for what it can.
- it can very easily let you chose the unit/subunit you want to enter your data in. (for example Hz/kHz/MHz, °C/°F/°K etc.)
- it can show you the used formulas of the current sub-category in “PrettyPrint”
Great ! How do I use it ?
- Be sure to run Nspire OS >= 3.0. We recommand version 3.1.0.392.
- You can then either use the “demo” database (a part of the original EE-Pro one) available here (and also attached) : https://github.com/adriweb/
EEPro-for-Nspire/blob/master/ EEPro.tns?raw=true - … or either starting your own database with our online FormulaPro Database maker which lets you easily create categories, subcategories, equations, units and subunits etc. It is available here: http://education.bwns.be/
FormulaPro/ - If you were on the online generator, click the “Generate” button at the bottom of the page.
- Transfer the .tns to your calculator or in the computer software and open it.
- Select the category and the subcategory, and begin filling the input fields of the data you already know. Press enter or change focus, and it will start auto-solving.
- Enjoy !
Screenshots time !
Here are 4 screenshots showing pretty much all of FormulaPro. They are not related to each other.
http://i.imgur.com/QtMeX.jpg, http://i.imgur.com/J7vJ0.jpg,
http://i.imgur.com/ZaqAY.jpg, http://i.imgur.com/8qud2.jpg,
What’s next ?
Well, we will try to complete the entire Formula library from the original EEPro-suite. (This is just a matter of time, so it’s no problem, really)
In general, the plan is to be able to do everything (and more !) that the TI-89 version can do.
So, here’s what we also planned for version 2.0 :
- Database Editing on-calc !
- An even more powerful solving core
- Smart Search (Don’t browse in the categories : just enter the units you have and it will try to figure out which equatinos to use directly)
- Pictures associated with categories (circuits explanations etc.)
- Input data directly into the solver using Vernier sensors!
- Multi-language support
- Ability to graph results
- …
Please report any bug or comments if you have some,
Good Luck and Have fun,
The FormulaPro team,