Quick Tip: Reviewing the Reference Guide (by Eric Findlay)

Over at the TI-Nspire Google Group, Eric Findlay has gone through the reference guide for OS 2.0 and has found some interesting features.  He writes:

Hi.  I just skimmed through the updated Reference Guide and typed up 
some notes about new functions and stuff.  (if it's not really new, 
please forgive me.  I might have had an old version before this). 

 

getLanginfo - this could be helpful for Nelson so he doesn't need 2 
different versions of his programs. 

 

getLockInfo - a way to check if a variable is locked.  This will be 
helpful in try-else blocks 

 

Request - Tip!  Remember to check the type of the variable after using 
request. 

 

Tip!  You can also request and store a function from the user.  See 
example in the Reference Guide. 

 

Tip!  Request can accept a string if it's enclosed in quotation marks. 
Otherwise, it's treated as an expression (and then converted to num, 
list, etc) 

 

Tip!  With Request and RequestStr, you can turn off displaying the 
request in the calc history by passing a 0 as the optional third argument. 

 

Tip!  Assign a value to the variable used for storage to give the 
Request box a default value.  DelVar the storage variable before reusing 
for more input (or set to "" or {} for string/list respectively). 

Also, Request can only be used in a Program (ie: not a function) 

 

Rotate - did you know that in addition to rotating binary number, you 
can also rotate strings and lists?  I didn't.  While I can't think of 
any great use for this right now, it's kind of neat.  Also applies to Shift. 

 

Stat functions and variables - the Reference Guide now shows tables of 
what variables each function and stat variable contains.  I believe this 
used to only be in the full manual. 

 

Text - the description says there are "OK" and "Cancel" buttons, but the 
example only shows the "OK" button.  Is there some undocumented way to 
choose which buttons you have?  If not, I think there should be.  Either 
like Java Swing, with preset options you can choose from, or fully 
customizable button labels. 

 

© - Makes a comment.  What many people don't know is that you can use 
the first line of a program/function to create a description comment 
that will show up in the catalogue.  Supposedly you can use the carriage 
return arrow button to create multi-line comments, but I tried in the 
software and it doesn't seem to work. 

 

Equation Operating System (EOS) hierarchy - Here's a new section 
basically explaining the Nspire order of operations, with a few notes 
and clarifications on their choices.