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Daily Trick 20. Quick Equation

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I believe most of us have already known that we can type in an equation on the Spotlight and straightaway get the result without the need to open Calculator. Also, I believe that only few of us know that we can do a quick equation without using Spotlight.

How can it be done?

  1. Type in the equation, let say (5*3)+8*9-3
  2. Highlight all of the equation and hit Cmd-Shift-8
  3. The equation will be immediately changed to 84
  4. It's important to note that some applications don't have this feature

So, next time if you want to do a quick equation, you should use this instead of Spotlight. Cheers from UsingMac!

Categories: Daily Tricks
Tags: Calculator, Daily Trick

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8 Comments

Chris Wanja

If you just type in Spotlight, it will do it right there for you. No need to shortcut or highlight text. You can use parentheses as well to do more complex equations. 

Alex

In what applications does it work????, I have't found one in which it does

Ajan

I agree with Chris.
Is it only with 10.5??

Wendy

I tried in TextEdit.

Chris Wanja

@Ajan - Yes, it does only work in 10.5 Leopard only. 

Ben

You can also just put the sum into the search box in safari and the first sugested item is the answer. (Just found that when testing this tip.. pritty niftey huh?)

Mark

That's an awesome tip…but, I've been using CalcService a freebie from DevonTechnologies that does the same, and more. My favorite feature is with the simple key combo cmd = it will place the result of a selected equation into the document itself. I encourage everyone to try it.

Harazy

I've tried this successfully in Leopard. However, it's no longer work in Snow Leopard.

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