Anyone else miss Reverse Polish Notation?

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Am I the only one who still misses Reverse Polish Notation on calculators?

It is, just as it always has been, vastly superior to the way normal calculators produce answers. The more complex the question, the more speed and accuracy RPN has to offer over the normal "2 + 2 X (7 - 3) =" variety.

If you have no idea what I am talking about, in RPN that is:
"2, Enter, 2, +, 7, Enter, 3, -, X"

The plastic on my poor Hewlett Packard 48g is finally wearing out, and I cannot find any replacements in the current market.

Am I the only one who weeps for the loss of this greatness, or are there any other RPN cultists about?

Never heard of it.

Is it "polish", as in "nail polish".

Or is it "Polish" as in "a citizen of the nation of Poland"?

Yes, especially since my HP-41CV was stolen.

I have a limited edition HP15C next to my computer mouse. I should have bought a spare one.

Polish as in Poland. I believe the name came about because Polish Notation was invented by a Polish Bloke, then Hewlett Packard flipped it around to make Reverse Polish Notation.

I've had an HP35s calculator since 2009. I really like it. It also does algebraic notation if you prefer that. I often do simple calculations on my desktop computer though, for which I use 'xcalc -rpn'.

I found it very easy to get used to and I struggle to go back to algebraic on calculators a lot of the time.

You can get calculator apps for iPhone now, but the better ones cost money. I bought one called PCalc because I got sick of the lame calculator apps Apple provides. It can do RPN. You can write your own functions in RPN, or non-RPN.
I like it. If you have an iPhone or iPad you can search for PCalc and/or rpn in the App Store.

I an sure there is something similar for android. For mac or Windows or linux I guess you could look for apps or use an android emulator:

https://www.instructables.com/Creating- ... _page=true

Or do it in Forth -

3 4 5 * + . 23 ok
3 4 + 5 * . 35 ok

: squared dup * ;
: cubed dup squared * ;
: forth-power squared squared ;

4 squared . 16 ok
4 cubed . 64 ok
4 squared cubed . 4096 ok
4 forth-power . 256 ok

Eeh, it's been a while since I went anywhere near this...

There is a version of Forth that runs on the Lego RCX (Lego’s first robot kit in the Mindstorms line).

So if you are a Lego Fan and miss RPN

● github - pbForth

● Wikipedia - Lego Mindstorms

● Bricklink.com - Robotics Invention System, Version 1.0 - Item No: 9719