Category Archives: Just for Fun

πhone number

Posted on by
Reply

 

Try dialing (253)243-2504. Go ahead. Do it now. It’s free and fun!

Christopher Poole has set up this dedicated phone number and when you call it, an automated voice reads you the digits of π. Very cool :-).

Here’s more info, courtesy of Mike Nathan at Hackaday:

As you well know, today is March 14th – aka “Pi Day”.

Celebrated in math classrooms around the country, this truly is a celebration that belongs to the geeks. Here at Hack-a-Day, we too love Pi day, though we might not outwardly celebrate it with as much gusto as expressed by some of our readers.

[Chris Poole] is one Hack-a-Day fan who knows how to make the most of this mathematical holiday. He has put together a neat SIP-based phone service that reads Pi aloud to anyone who calls. He is running Asterisk in combination with Perl to read off the numbers, and is using a free SIP DID number to accept the calls. We gave it a shot earlier today, and were greeted by a gentle synthesized voice reading off the numbers of Pi. We’re not sure how many digits it is programmed to handle, as we stopped after about 20, so give him a call and let us know how many digits you make it through.

(more)

 

And here’s a direct link to Christopher Poole’s website.

 

Obligatory π Day Post

Posted on by
Reply

Happy π-day.

 

We had lots and lots of pie, cookies, chips, cheese balls, and other ’round’ snacks today. A fun excuse for a party :-). I showed them a powerpoint with some interesting facts about π. One of my classes even got to whoop and holler at 1:59:26.

I showed some of my classes this:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmXkDbGdD4Q&feature=player_embedded&rel=0%5D

 

And I showed one of my classes this, which was put up just today by Vi Hart (bonus: see if you can find the small error in this video):

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG7vhMMXagQ&feature=player_embedded&rel=0%5D

 

I’m not sure where I stand on the whole Tau thing. I do think it helps with learning the unit circle and trig values. But I’m not convinced it makes most formulas simpler. And history is a force to be reckoned with. There is lots of mathematical notation that could use some revision, I suppose.

 

Physics of Angry Birds

Posted on by
Reply

A nice projectile motion application, suitable for almost any level of high school math.

Here’s an excerpt of the Wired.com article by Rhett Allain:

You know the game, I know you know. Angry Birds. I have an attraction to games like this. You can play for just a little bit at a time (like that) and each time you shoot, you could get a slightly different result. Oh, you don’t know Angry Birds? Well, the basic idea is that you launch these birds (which are apparently angry) with a sling shot. The goal is to knock over some pigs. Seriously, that is the game.

But what about the physics? Do the birds have a constant vertical acceleration? Do they have constant horizontal velocity? Let’s find out, shall we? Oh, why would I do this? Why can’t I just play the dumb game and move on. That is not how I roll. I will analyze this, and you can’t stop me.

 

[Hat tip: Tony Sanders]