// many young people (yes, I know how that sounds) do not know how useful a good engineering calculator //
It's ok, I sound like that too. The problem is that in order to be acceptable for school use, calculators have to be so lobotomized that they are useless for real engineering work. The keyboard cannot be qwerty, it has to have lockdown modes which shut off functionality, etc etc.
Frankly, as a math teacher, I'd be just as happy if my students could program their calculators to help them on assignments and tests.
// I wish there was a good HP50G emulator for iOS//
The “no QWERTY rule” that standardized testing boards have is _absurd_. TI has a calculator with a dedicated alphabet keyboard cluster and a return key (the Nspire Touchpad)… except the keys have to be arranged in alphabetical order, because otherwise the College Board says no.
It's ok, I sound like that too. The problem is that in order to be acceptable for school use, calculators have to be so lobotomized that they are useless for real engineering work. The keyboard cannot be qwerty, it has to have lockdown modes which shut off functionality, etc etc.
Frankly, as a math teacher, I'd be just as happy if my students could program their calculators to help them on assignments and tests.
// I wish there was a good HP50G emulator for iOS//
A calculator has to have buttons man :-)