jb1991 2 days ago

"1+1 sq ft in sq in="

The order of operations here is quite ambiguous. It’s not obvious even to a human reader how you would expect this to be interpreted.

▲ rgovostes 20 hours ago | parent | next [-]

There is a perfectly cromulent grammar for a unit-aware calculator:

    <expression without units> [<unit> [in <unit>]]
    <expression with units> [in <unit>]

"1+2 feet in meters" and "1 foot + 1 meter" are both unambiguous. There is no order of operations in terms of how the units bind. The expression "1 foot + 1" is appropriately invalid.

Of course the appropriate care must be paid to interpreting "in" correctly as either a unit or a keyword.

▲ mulmen 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I honestly can't tell what this would mean other than 2 square feet in inches. What's the other option?

	▲	fzzzy a day ago \| parent \| next [-]
		(1 sq ft in sq in) + 1?
	▲	fluidcruft a day ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Another option could be that it's ill-posed and should just return an error.