How much has RPN/RPL spoiled you?

[Dave Britten]

There are two things I miss most when using a TI/Casio/other algebraic:

1. Being able to quickly copy an intermediate result partway through a problem to come back and try something else with it later, and also spot/correct errors more easily.

2. Writing programs/functions that behave like built-ins, i.e. they accept input parameters, and return outputs, which can then be passed to other functions. The TI-92 family is the only algebraic I can think of that lets you write user-defined functions (or the Psion Organiser II, but it makes a pretty clumsy calculator).

Not to mention I usually stuff up the parentheses when entering anything lengthy on an algebraic machine that evaluates immediately rather than having a full text-based entry line. This includes the HP 20S, nice as it may be for an algebraic.

That said, I do think that the BASIC-like language of the TIs makes it easier to write self-documenting code that doesn't require reverse-engineering what's happening on the stack. RPN and RPL can be, much like Perl and regexes, a write-only language at times. TIs also make it generally easier to write interactive programs, with more straight-forward interactive IO and branching. As much as I agree with structured programming for large projects, at times I feel like the 48's RPL leaned on it a bit too heavily.

Unrelated: I wonder who the youngest members are. I know Tim and I are both around 32. Anybody pre-university here?