A new kind of search engine just launched today. Dubbed a “computational knowledge engine”, it leverages Mathematica, an extremely powerful technical computing software. I played around with Mathematica very briefly while in university, but math has always been beyond my ken and my experience with the software was very akin to that of someone gingerly prodding a mysterious and somewhat frightening object with a stick. It didn’t bite back, but I knew to leave well enough alone. I did realise that it was capable of much more than I could ever hope to understand though, and the thought left me somewhat wistful even as I bid it adieu.
Now it’s back, and in a much more accessible form dubbed Wolfram|Alpha. Aside from what I think is a very cool name, it makes complex mathematical calculations possible even by people who are as mathematically dense as myself. Beyond that though, it presents information in all sorts of fascinating ways as you can see below.
The first query was of my company’s name, and the second was of a random math formula that I ripped off Wikipedia (heavens, don’t even think I would claim to have the slightest inkling of what that formula is looking for – all mathematical formulas make me go cross-eyed >_<)
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You can even do a search for “mongolia weather” or (this is very cool) “International Space Station 4/6/09 at 7:45pm”
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Wolfram|Alpha is no Google killer, at least not yet. The vast majority of internet surfers are not going to change over anytime soon, not when Google finds relevant information so quickly, and so accurately on such a wide range of queries such as telephone numbers to that bakery store down the street, addresses/directions to Yokohama, images of lolcats, reviews of the new Star Trek movie, links to downloads, walkthroughs on gamefaqs… heck, the everyday questions one comes up with. Wolfram|Alph DOES shine when it comes to more scientific/professional usage, and I can see it becoming a big hit with that community.
It’s still in it’s early stages though. Google didn’t get to where it is now overnight, and I have a feeling that as time goes by, Wolfram|Alpha will definitely improve and become more accessible. At the very least it will serve as competition to Google and give users another way to access the constantly expanding amount of data that’s out there.
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