43S News

[Walter]

Expect keypad feel like on DM42.

@Bob: I just wanted to add a keyword making life easier for Michael looking for 'Michael'.

@All (well, maybe only many): if you open a Voyager or an earlier HP calculator, you will find individual keys. Each of them sits in its own little niche allowing for the famous rotate-and-click operation. If you open a Pioneer or any newer HP calculator or a DM42, on the other hand, you will find an entire sprue connecting all its keys - rotate-and-click became bend-and-click actually there. Advantage is easier (simpler, politely: more cost-effective) production and assembly, disadvantage is the impossibility to exchange individual keys.
So, if you want something like you sketched above, you have to provide a mix of both designs: two niches for the prefix keys and one sprue for the other ones. If you want full exchangeability of all keys, you have to make a major design change leading to a far more difficult assembly - and I doubt you'll be willing to pay the cost of that.
But this is only my personal opinion, YMMV.

[rprosperi]

@Bob: I just wanted to add a keyword making life easier for Michael looking for 'Michael'.

Exactly right, I did the same for the same reason.

[Walter]

BTW, you find the newest layout here right now: https://sourceforge.net/projects/wp43s/ ... =directory

[Walter]

... and see here what's going on: https://a.fsdn.com/con/app/proj/wp43s/s ... /max/max/1

Merry forthcoming Christmas!

[cdmackay]

... and see here what's going on: https://a.fsdn.com/con/app/proj/wp43s/s ... /max/max/1

Merry forthcoming Christmas!

Looks great

I had a few questions, apologies if this has all been discussed already?

- I assume the three rows of boxes at the bottom of the screen are three sets of soft-keys functions for the top row of bottoms? is that unshifted, f & g? If so, have you thought about labelling which row is which? Or something else entirely?

- What's the thinking behind moving the up/down arrows to the RHS? Given they're on the LHS on the WP 34S, HP 42S & DM42? I can see me getting confused, especially switching back and forth from the DM42, with identical physical form factor…

thanks & Merry Christmas and Hogmanay.

[rprosperi]

- I assume the three rows of boxes at the bottom of the screen are three sets of soft-keys functions for the top row of bottoms? is that unshifted, f & g? If so, have you thought about labelling which row is which? Or something else entirely?

Yes, look at the images linked in the post just above. There will be blank (unshifted), blue- and yellow- shift bands on the sides of these lines to make it unambiguous on the real machines.

- What's the thinking behind moving the up/down arrows to the RHS? Given they're on the LHS on the WP 34S, HP 42S & DM42? I can see me getting confused, especially switching back and forth from the DM42, with identical physical form factor…

The left side of the 43S will retain the correct location of the 4 math operators, as perfected on the classic through 41 series of machines. Later ideas, although not without some merit, have wandered away from the obviously correct original solution. The 34S is that way due to the underlying 20b and 30b layouts, and the DM42 that way, because of the 42S design. As the 43S is not based on any specific model design, we are free to implement this correctly without baggage.

To say more is to awake a religious discussion, which like all such discussions are more about passionate beliefs than facts. It's also worthwhile mentioning that this topic was subject to lots of discussion in the last year (again!) and culminated in a community vote and decision to go this way. If I've left something out, my friend Massimo will fill in the gaps.

[cdmackay]

thanks very much Bob,

Yes, look at the images linked in the post just above. There will be blank (unshifted), blue- and yellow- shift bands on the sides of these lines to make it unambiguous on the real machines.

Ah yes, I remember seeing those and not realising what they were

The left side of the 43S will retain the correct location of the 4 math operators, as perfected on the classic through 41 series of machines.

Ah! I even looked at a 41 when writing my last post, but merely noted that it doesn't (of course) have up/down arrows; I failed to realise that it's the arithmetic operators that were the decider, not the arrows. OK, understood.

To say more is to awake a religious discussion, which like all such discussions are more about passionate beliefs than facts. It's also worthwhile mentioning that this topic was subject to lots of discussion in the last year (again!) and culminated in a community vote and decision to go this way. I

Absolutely

That was probably before I discovered this forum. Would someone have a pointer to that thread(s), please, for my education?

I will re-read this thread again, to make sure it's not in this one

[Walter]

Before this very forum was founded in 2017, discussions about 43S took place on the fora of hpmuseum.org. Official start of the project you are looking at right now was in November 2012 - simply search for "43S" or "WP43S" there. Open discussions there became difficult, however, due to a "clash of cultures" and a so-called "super moderator" of said forum who should be called "agitator" correctly. They were actually interrupted in June 2016 since the author dared to wish the USA less bullets after a shooting - this wish turned out being a head-on collision with said person. Since that clash occurred on an US forum you can guess how it ended.

Anyway: you should find all information about 43S at hpmuseum.org until mid 2016 and at swissmicros.com from 2017 on.

If - after reading the sources mentioned - you have further questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

[cdmackay]

understood, thanks!

[akaTB]

my friend Massimo will fill in the gaps.

My tagline says it all.