Talk:WolframAlpha

Wolfram Alpha page should be reinstated

I gather this was deleted since it met Wikipedia's criteria for speedy deletion "as an article about a web site, blog, web forum, webcomic, podcast, browser game, or similar web content that does not indicate the importance or significance of the subject."

A Google search of "Wolfram Alpha" (which includes the quotation marks) responds with:

Results 1 - 10 of about 2,080,000 English pages for "Wolfram alpha". (0.07 seconds)

Any technology which is generating 2.1 million Google hits before it is officially released, must be conceived by many to have significant importance. Whether that importance was expressed in the original article I do not know, as I did not read it.

Stephen Wolfram is not exactly a modest man (he drastically overstated the importance of his New Kind of Science for example), so the importance might not be as great as may be claimed, but if it generates 2.1 million Google hits, I would say Wolfram Alpha is important enough to have a Wikipedia entry.

Drkirkby (talk) 09:10, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I've added some citations that I lifted from Stephen Wolfram and restored the article since I feel it now meets every relevant criterion for retention. Thanks are due to Drkirkby, who brought this to my attention. Accounting4Taste:talk 15:18, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank God, it's back

I created the first version that was destined for speed-deletion by someone, and despite attempts to hold on, it really disappeared a day later. That was crazy. I would personally be surprised if this became a Google killer, on the commercial front etc., but some people think so and it is clear that it is a big and highly nontrivial multi-million project of a world's leader in computer manipulation with data and the article about it on Wikipedia can't be missing. --Lumidek (talk) 10:09, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Whoever submitted it for deletion is clearly an idiot with no foresight whatsoever. Crazy Eddy (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:47, 18 May 2009 (UTC).

Wikipedia RIP

I guess this was deleted 'coz this is supposed to be capable of putting Wikipedia to grave - since the data returned to the query will be ones input by experts, unlike Wikipedia, where anyone can contribute

although personally i think that's impossible, due to several very obvious reasons. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aditya Gautam (talk • contribs) 12:47, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Corrected Name of Search Engine

Wolfram Alpha is not actually the name of the search engine; it is Wolfram|Alpha, as used on the search engine site and in the blog for the search engine. http://blog.wolframalpha.com/--Gramery (talk) 22:41, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Discussion About Renaming Page

This page should correctly be called Wolfram|Alpha, not Wolfram Alpha. However, renaming the page correctly means that a markup character (|) will be part of the title. I have never done a rename/ redirect to an article before, and because the new name is unusual, I'd like to get feedback on whether it is a good idea. I don't think most people know the correct name now, and so virtually everyone would be going to the redirect page first. And if people agree with me that the change is appropriate, I don't mind if someone with more experience does the move. Before this I have only corrected grammar mistakes and typos.Gramery (talk) 00:57, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

The pipe character is not allowed in page titles. A template is available for this case: {{pipe in title}}, which renders:

--Waldir ^talk 10:31, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I am not going to use the template to put the comment up about the correct name of the page until further discussion takes place on what name the engine should use in the article. Despite the comment in the history reverting the change, the pipe character is used within the website and the blog website- and they have the pipe character in the html title for a reason- because that is the correct name.Gramery (talk) 18:42, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Pipe character removal from Wolfram|Alpha text in article

I am not going to start a revision war, however, even some of the article titles on this page use a pipe character or a / to represent the name of the search engine, despite the comments on the revision that took the | character out of the name. See bulleted link 2 in Further Reading, and bulleted link 3 in External links. As this is the correct name of Stephen Wolfram's creation, it should be represented correctly in the article. Please provide further discussion to explain why the search engine name should not be represented correctly.Gramery (talk) 18:31, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

OK, the pipe is sometimes used, most notably by Wolfram's blog. The official webpage is ambiguous, though. Many publications go against that "annoying" character in the plain text. Why you're so convinced what is the "correct" version? (I think time will show.) I am not going to start a revision war either; if the pipe prevails I'll change it myself. For the moment I think we should mention the "piped" version in the lead and use the typical ordinary "spaced" version in the text. Others may have different ideas. ptrf (talk) 20:59, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for noting your reasons. Since the article is referencing both now, I am willing to wait and see what the title becomes with usage once the engine goes live. I do agree that it is an extremely awkward name, and they may decide to change it officially.Gramery (talk) 14:42, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

verifiability

i think wolfram alpha raises some interesting questions regarding verifiability. obviously, the overriding one - WA seems to base its info on verifiable sources; does it follow that WA is a verifiable source? --Kaini (talk) 02:18, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

if you look at the faq page on the site, they consider it a primary source for academic purposes. riffic (talk) 02:21, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

hmmm that's somewhat good - a secondary source is often nicer for wiki purposes. but regardless, i have no doubt it will become a useful tool for editors. --Kaini (talk) 02:25, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I have raised the matter for discussion at WikiProject Mathematics. --Pleasantville (talk) 15:58, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Limitations

I've noticed some cases where the response given by the software is more than a little confusing. Try http://www96.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=y^x%3Dx^y, for instance. The solution offered is incomplete, and the graph does not cover the more interesting parts of the equality. Then try http://www96.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=plot+y^x%3Dx^y%2C+x%3D-2..6%2C+y%3D-2..6. It fails to plot anything, and does not offer any explanation as to why. Does anyone know what's going on here? 114.76.44.0 (talk) 09:19, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

y^x=x^y from 2 to 6 appears to plot the graph correctly. AledJames (talk) 12:21, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Gross Limitations

Although typing into the search bar the expression (1.001)^1000 yields a correct answer, wolframalpha.com evaluates (1.0001)^10000 (and all higher powers) as zero! Why not just say "limits of computation exceeded" or whatever?

Another example, typing in "Rexford Tugwell" (a member of FDR's Brain Trust, and fictiously appointed Roosevelt's successor by Phillip K. Dick), the site yields the answer "Did you mean Rexford Maxwell?".

Well if you can't even provide information easily found in Wikipedia, what good are you? Seriously though, it just shows how hard a problem it is to create a computer as smart as a rather dull human being.

WolframAlpha will never replace Google, or rival HAL, though it is a handy shortcut to all kinds of information. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.63.171.24 (talk) 16:07, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

For what it's worth, you can get the correct result using exact input: "(1+1/10000)^10000" or compute how well this approximates e: "(1+1/10000)^10000 - e"--GregRM (talk) 02:59, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Wolfram|Alpha redirection?!

It's bad enough that the correct title of the article cannot be Wolfram|Alpha, but can we at least have Wolfram|Alpha redirect here?! Crazy Eddy (talk) 19:46, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

You can't have a redirect from that because you would need a page with that title. (And if that were the case, there'd be no need for a redirect.) --Rajah (talk) 05:46, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

logo trivia

The logo used by Wolfram|Alpha is a polyhedron known as "rhombic hexecontahedron".[1]

Source: [1] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/RhombicHexecontahedron.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.195.6.10 (talk) 21:48, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

British mogul?

The opening paragraph refers to Stephen Wolfram as British mogul. I am wondering if that's the right term to use. He used to be a scientist, until now he was predominantly developing and selling scientific software. Maybe his profession could be left out or maybe businessman is a better term? Ben ^T/_C 11:01, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

OK, I did that. The article about SW says physicist, mathematician and businessman. Stating all threes would be too long in this intro, IMHO. --Ettrig (talk) 12:49, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

cyc

I cut a quote from Douglas Lenat, founder of Cyc, since it seemed to be an extended comparison of the two programs, and i felt that wasn't really part of the overview. I left in the reference to WA's similarity to cyc though, since the fact the concept *isn't* new *is* relevant. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jasemurphy (talk • contribs) 06:37, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

reception

I've put in some text under the heading 'reception', since we've reached the stage in the media cycle where most of the hype is about the hype... Jasemurphy (talk) 06:41, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

wfalpha.com & wolfa.com & wolpha.com

wfalpha.com is not a "short link" to Wolfram Alpha. It is a (probably illegal) mirror site which appears to be in Morroco. --Pleasantville (talk) 16:20, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

I had removed it earlier from here and sister projects. I've opened an incident at ANI asking for it to be added to the blacklist. I also made a request at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist. --rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid (coṁrá) 16:59, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

In general, let's not add links to any kind of "mirror sites" (in particular those with advertisements). I removed the googfram.com link from the article, as it provides no new information. — Miym (talk) 06:49, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Someone has been repeatedly adding links to another mirror site, wolfa.com. Please do not add mirror site links as per this discussion. --Pleasantville (talk) 16:32, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Someone? My research shows that several distinct people have tried adding wolfa.com as its popularity has grown.

I have looked into this and spoken with a lawyer friend of mine. Referencing wfalpha.com, it is clear that the party was hosting an illegal mirror since they were posting ads using frames to profit from WolframAlpha without their consent. In the case of wolfa.com, it is being provided in "good faith" by someone who works for Wolfram without any ads or intent to profit from the mirror. Additionally, I looked further into the redirection and like I said before, wolfa.com is using a direct mirror (pointing directly to the IP address of WolframAlpha), in which case it is not possible for any content to be tampered with or ads to be added to this "URL." My lawyer friend has informed me that this is "in no way illegal" since all it is doing is promoting the service and helping it with "good faith" efforts.

This begs the question that if several people think this is worth mentioning in the Wiki article, why does your opinion weigh heavier than all of ours? Are you in charge? Shouldn't majority rule? I mean no disrespect. I'm new to the community and don't understand. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.205.101.174 (talk) 02:33, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

I looked closer. What you say appears to be false. I find no references to a Wolfram employee being involved. The domain is registered anonymously. It is not pointing directly at wolframalpha.com, it is acting as a proxy. walfa operates on 208.91.128.57, while wolframalpha operates on 140.177.205.54. The walfa operator could inject any kind of malware or other content whenever it chooses. The fact that it has not chosen to yet is not evidence of good faith. All of the injections of walfa.com into wikipedia seem to be single purpose new accounts. This has all the hallmarks of a scam, and should not be promoted to wikipedia users. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.155.127.111 (talk) 08:57, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Your knowledge of DNS is minimal. www.wolframalpha.com has the following IP addresses mapped to it: 208.91.128.57, 140.177.205.123, 140.177.205.54, and 140.177.16.25. Type them directly into your browser to validate. Cwiker (talk) 09:50, 27 October 2009 (UTC)Cwiker

Wikipedia is not a telephone directory. One link to a website is sufficient. Specificallly in relation to redirect sites (regardless of their origin), see the style guideline for external links: "URL redirection sites are not to be used." --rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid (coṁrá) 08:59, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Also, Network Solutions has wolfa.com at the IP 208.254.3.166 which is not affiliated with the company Wolfram Research.[1] --Pleasantville (talk) 11:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC).

If you look at Network Solutions more closely, you will notice "Data as of: 06-May-2006." If you investigate further, you will notice that the IP is owned by Verizon Communications Inc. In other words, Verizon owned this domain back in 2006, but that has nothing to do with it currently.[2] Cwiker (talk) 23:28, 27 October 2009 (UTC) Cwiker

Cwiker has been blocked indefinitely for using multiple accounts; he was part of a group of accounts pushing for links to wolfa.com.--Pleasantville (talk) 14:11, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Queries submitted to wolpha.com now yield the message "Blocked Your request was submitted via a website unaffiliated with Wolfram|Alpha and without license to utilize Wolfram|Alpha's services. Please go to www.wolframalpha.com and attempt your query again. Thank you. — The Wolfram|Alpha Team"--Pleasantville (talk)) 13:16, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Stephen Wolfram

This is a page about Wolfram Alpha, not Stephen Wolfram. The description of Stephen Wolfram on this page should be consistent with his Wikipedia entry. Assessment of Stephen Wolfram should take place on the Stephen Wolfram Wikipedia entry, not here and should be consistent with WP:BLP standards. --Pleasantville (talk) 12:00, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

What about we change the sentence in the lead to "It was announced in March 2009 Stephen Wolfram, creator of Mathematica", or something similar? The he's a physicist, author, businessman, etc. is pretty irrelevant for this article. That he created Mathematica on the other hand, on which Wolfram Alpha is heavily based on, is quite relevant for the lead of this article. --Conti|✉ 12:12, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

It initially said physicist, as I recall, which is consistent with the article, as he is primarily by academic training a physicist. It has been endlessly played with, moastly by people editing from IP numbers.--Pleasantville (talk) 12:27, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

I have been following with great amusement the various qualifications that Stephen Wolfram has been receiving. I just undid your last edit which seems to me like the best compromise. The point is this: Stephen Wolfram is extremely good at self-promotion, and four qualifications for him is strongly reminiscent of the self propaganda for which he is famous. Is he a physicist? He has a degree in physics, but so does Douglas Coupland. Is he doing physics? Only if you believe him that we should abandon all modern physics and do physics via cellular automata instead. Is he a mathematician? Only if you believe that holing yourself up away from the mathematical community for many years and producing a book of which that community is widely skeptical (citations available if you need them) and seems neither new (many others have worked on the same ideas), nor science (unless you believe again in the almighty cellular automata) nor kind (he present all the work with a vague hint that it's all his without explicitly crediting ideas to others) is mathematics. He is undeniably an author (has recently published a book) and a businessman (Mathematica and Wolfram Alpha pull in a pretty penny), but the other qualifications aren't so clear-cut.

My point is this: I agree with you that this is not the place to discuss Wolfram's character. That should be done in his article. The problem is that putting those four qualifications sounds propagandist and contestable by the very same academic community that supposedly grants those recognitions. Removing all qualifications and letting readers click on his hyperlinked name should they want to find out more about Wolfram's character seems like a good compromise here. Alternatively, labelling him here simply as "principal force behind Mathematica" or similar seems good too for this article (his authorship of Mathematica is also contested, as he initially wrestled copyright from his coauthors by threats and lawsuits, his litigious tendencies are well-known too). Swap (talk) 13:25, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

whilst i don't know a whole lot about mr. wolfram (i briefly used mathematica in college, and have toyed with WA), it's indisputable the recent anon material belongs in the Stephen Wolfram article, if anywhere. one thing i have observed is that large chunks of the biography article read very WP:ADVERTy --Kaini (talk) 00:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

OR

I just removed the OR template. In fact, the section in question lists some simple examples that are easily verifiable by direct copy-pasting into WA. The last para is referenced. The first one contains some rather well-known characteristics, see e.g. WA blog (linked elsewhere), I see no big need for a ref (but feel free to add one if you like). ptrf (talk) 14:46, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Can references be renumbered automatically?

As of the time of me writing this, the first reference in the article is numbered 3. The second reference is numbered 1. Does Wikipedia support automatic numbering? If so, it would clearly be logical that they are renumbered. Drkirkby (talk) 23:08, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

It is renumbering automatically. But the numbering is starting from the infobox, because that's the first text in the article. Trivialist (talk) 00:58, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

In connection with this, see Bugzilla:18890 and this test wiki. Note that the cite errors seen on the main page of the test wiki are intentional for testing purposes. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:07, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:MOSTM

Follow standard English text formatting and capitalization rules even if the trademark owner considers nonstandard formatting "official": [...]

Avoid using special characters that are not pronounced, are included purely for decoration [...]. In the article about a trademark, it is acceptable to use decorative characters the first time the trademark appears, but thereafter, an alternative that follows the standard rules of punctuation should be used:

Since there's no overwhelming reason why the pipe should be an exception to this rule, I've taken it out, and hope it stays that way. 81.110.104.91 (talk) 13:45, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The limit that doesn't exist

I added a brief explanation as to why the limit that Wolfram says is 0 doesn't exist, as there was previously no justification for this statement. I'd like to explain a little more thoroughly, but I don't want to clutter up the article. A solid reference would be better than any kind of explanation in this article, in my opinion.

I guess that the inclusion to observe that wrong answers do happen is a valid one, but perhaps if/when the article gets longer, it'd be better to have this example under a "limitations section" or similar. A longer explanation probably wouldn't feel out of place there... Tcnuk (talk) 14:14, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

The Iphone Application

On October 17th, 2009 Apple approved the Wolfram Alpha Iphone/Ipod Touch Application. Someone should add this to the Article, as I do not have the exact time. Link to the Application is Here. Techcrunch recently covered it, Here. Rttam^TN_C 00:53, 19 October 2009 (UTC)