I received a great suggestion to make a instacalc bookmarklet:

Bookmarklets are special links that interact with the page you’re on. The instacalc bookmarklet makes a live, interactive window to type calculations!

Installation (Internet Explorer/FireFox/Opera/Safari):

• Right click this link: instacalc bookmarklet and Add to favorites/bookmarks. That’s it! (Click the link for a live preview).
• Put the bookmark in your toolbar for quick access.

Usage: Click the bookmark to open an instacalc window on the current page:

• Just type and go! Currently selected text is copied in by default.
• Close with the red “x” (or click the pink region). If you close the calc, click the bookmark again to continue where you left off.
• The calc should stay in the upper-right corner as you scroll the page.

Now you can get to instacalc when checking your email, posting on forums, or just surfing the web.

Bugs and Feedback: I threw this together fairly quickly — let me know if it works, if there’s bugs, or features you’d like to see (multiple rows, etc.). The bookmark always uses the latest version, so you don’t need to worry about updating it. Enjoy!

Just a few quick updates today:

• Better Performance. InstaCalc should load faster and be more responsive overall. For the geeks, I’ve streamlined the code by caching intermediate results and loading them where appropriate.

• Better Logging. I’ve put in some code to help debug errors as they happen on your side, with less need for explicit error reports.

• Minor bugfixes. Some minor tweaks here and there. Cell titles (”this_is_a_test = 3″) should now show up as “this is a test” when minimized (there was a problem with underscores before). 3/7% does the right thing, and behaves as 3/(7%), not (3/7)%.

Also, I’ve acquired calcr.com — Stefan, the previous owner, was kind enough to offer it to me before putting it on the public market. I like the super-streamlined interface, and will be working on an “InstaCalc-powered” version of calcr. There’s more than one way to solve a problem; choose the best tool for the job .

A few quick updates:

• I recently made a podcast with J Murali from The Hindu.

• BetterExplained has an article on lessons from starting Ruby on Rails, used to make the shared calcs. It was my first really popular article (it got dugg!) and I’m thrilled people found it useful.

• I’m trying new interface ideas for InstaCalc which should come out soon. You can check out some experiments at http://instacalc.com/beta.

I’ve just arrived in Cambridge (not that Cambridge) to work with some friends in Y Combinator. It’s a startup bootstrapping program that lets you take an idea and work feverishly over 3 months to develop it into something grand (that’s the plan, anyway).

InstaCalc isn’t actually the focus for the summer, so I’ll be taking a small hiatus from major development. However, a few features may sneak in here and there, mostly things I’ve been working on but haven’t yet released, the B-side tracks and minor features that you still may enjoy.

If you are in the Boston area, feel free to give me an email (kalid@instacalc.com) if you’d like to meet up. I’m always happy to talk shop or shoot the breeze with fellow tech heads.

I’ve had a lot of fun talking to entrepreneurs at OpenCoffee and other local events. In addition to meeting dozens of interesting people, you answer the inevitable:

So… what are you working on?

InstaCalc is one of my projects (there’s others and some yet to be announced) but it’s a bit strange to say “I work on a calculator.”

In practicing my elevator pitch I try to emphasize the following

• Faster than Calc, Easier than Excel
• Web 2.0 goodness: instant results, grab live currency feeds, embeddable widgets
• Avoid “spreadsheet bingo” like E12 + D43
• Link and share any result, no need to login, send attachments or install software

I then try to jump into a scenario like sharing numbers about the YouTube deal.

I’ve still not perfected my pitch, and frankly I prefer a demo. It’s hard to say “This calculator is really fun and unlike anything out there!” and have people believe you without seeing it

But here’s the problem: You can’t pitch everyone.

Most people will visit the site without ever having met me. They don’t know it’s fast, easy and shareable. They don’t know you can do unit conversions or use variables or share links. So, I’ve revamped the homepage with:

• Explanatory text / feature list
• Pre-loaded examples (you can still bookmark a blank calc)
• A cleaner overall layout, including a “Clear” button in the top row.

It’s an experiment in not making people think about what InstaCalc can do. Hope you like the new look.

Yesterday I gave a 10-minute talk at Seattle Tech Startups about Instacalc. If you’re in the Seattle area I encourage you to check it out as a chance to see what the community is up to.

The talk was a lot of fun and I got a chance to meet several people afterwards. One reason I enjoyed the demo was because of Toastmasters. I’ve never really liked public speaking, but through the club I learned what aspects I do like (storytelling, humor, relaxed approach) and I tailored my presentation around that. And I’ve grown to like speaking as a result.

The format was pretty straightforward: I started with stories of how Windows Calc is too simple (it emulates a pocket calculator), Excel is too much (it emulates a spreadsheet and hasn’t changed in 30 years), and there’s a need for something in-between. The slides had a single screenshot or word, Steve Jobs style, to keep it simple.

I then did a mini tour of the features, such as instant results, natural language entry, unit conversion, sharing links and using the shared calcs. I compared the before-and-after: what you’d have to do in Excel (”=D3 * (1 + .5)”) and what you can do in InstaCalc (”sales + 50%”). Time flies when you talk about what you enjoy — go with what you know!

The best part was being able to chat with people afterwards — we stayed up till 12:30 (the talk ended at 8pm), at which point I stumbled to a burger joint and stuffed myself.

Here’s a few writeups related to the event:

• Drew Meyer’s Blog
• A startup a day
• Bryan Starbucks’ Blog

Never underestimate the fun of stepping out into the real world — I should do it more often .

After incorporating feedback, I have some great new features for you to try out:

1. Use spaces in variable names

This was a biggie — I hated writing underscores between variables, and I’m sure you did too. Try this instead:

Wow! Use real, readable variables like “net sales” and “net cost”. I don’t know of any other programming languages that let you do this . We’ve come a long way from using “=E2 - C3″ in spreadsheet land.

2. Write equations in any order

Computers think linearly, but we don’t. Previously I required you to set your variables before they were used — no more! Put ‘em in any order you like:

How does Instacalc know what to do? Magic mind-reading fairies.

3. Use unicode variable names

For the international crowd, feel free to use all the accents and special characters you like:

And yep, you can use spaces in your unicode variable names also.

More feedback the merrier

I want to make InstaCalc easier and easier to use by eliminating the common headaches we face when solving problems. These features were the direct result of your feedback, so thank you! Your suggestions help improve the site for everyone, so keep it coming!

PS. I’ve received some suggestions about date & time calculations, which I’m looking into — stay tuned

There’s a fun announcement today: my.instacalc.com is live and available for testing! Call it YouTube meets Excel meets Wikipedia if you like — it’s really just about sharing solutions to problems.

You can browse public calculations, save your own, or leave a comment — and any changes you’ve made are saved. Here are the features:

Fast Browsing

Imagine I gave you a directory full of spreadsheets. How would you “browse” them? Open each in Excel separately? Yeck. Try this:

Calcs appear in a list — you get an instant preview when you move your mouse over the name. No “put your left click in and your back button back” hokey-pokey dance when trying to find what you need. Move the mouse, find what you like, and click to get the full version. Fast, easy and simple.

Simple Sharing

I’m a user too. I hate logins and forgotten passwords — I just want answers fast and without a hassle, and I imagine you are similar.

Create a new calc (or import an existing link), pick a title and description, and save it. Boom. Zero to shared calc in 10 seconds flat:

Once you have your calc, anyone can leave a comment. Your original calc stays the same, but you can click the date of any comment to see the numbers used at that time. Instantly.

Powerful Searching

We’re used to searching for the title or description of what we want. That’s great, but the meat of the content is inside the calculator. Guess what? You can search text inside the calc. If you want to find calculations that have the word “rent” somewhere inside them, just search for rent.

You can even find the calcs that use square root.

Ready, Set, Share

This is the first round of sharing. The interface, the features, the layout — they will all change in the future. The goal was to stop the cycle of endless tweaking and get something out there for everyone to try.

Once the sharing site has done a test-run, I’ll make it a part of the main site. Feel free to share your calcs! I’m interested to see how people are using the site and any feedback you have.

I’ve created a basic Vista Gadget for your calculating pleasure:

Install it from the Windows Vista Gallery site.

I personally think the gadget was pretty useful and gave it a good rating — a zealous commenter saw this and decided to “even it out” . Ah, the ebb and flow of web tools — I just hope people find it useful.

The gadget acts just like the website - you can use unit conversions (”15 feet in cm”), readable numbers (”3.3 billion”), and equations (”a = 3; b = 4; a+b”).

If you mouse over the calculator you’ll see an option to save a permalink, which takes you to the main site.

This version is my first foray into Vista Gadget development and is on a single line; the sidebar doesn’t have much screen real estate. Based on feedback and demand, I may create a multi-row version. I’m starting with the basics and expanding from there.

As an aside, I’m continuing to work on enhanced sharing features for the main site. My core design philosophy is to keep the simple things simple and not harass visitors about logins, emails or registrations. I want the site to be useful on your first visit — stay tuned.

Thanks everyone who gave me feedback on the beta! The command-bar and the scratchpad view seemed to be well-received, and I’ve put the former on the main site:

You can now browse through the available commands and see some examples of how they are used. The rest of the site got a face-lift as well. The scratchpad will be going to the homepage as well, but there’s a bit more I’d like to do with it.

But what else has been keeping me busy? Well, there’s a conspicuous tab on the homepage. And it is a bit strange to have only one: the reason being that it will have a neighbor in the near future. InstaCalc is about making numbers easy and fun to share, and I have some ideas around just that

By the way, I was fortunate enough to get mentioned on a discussion of Web interfaces on CodingHorror:

Online applications may be awkward, but they do one key thing that local applications can never do: embed snippets of live content in a web page. Instacalc may never be Excel, but so what? It’s a completely different use case. Instacalc is ideal for embedding bite-sized, interactive nuggets of calculation next to a paragraph of text on a web page. It’s the YouTube of spreadsheets.

It’s an interesting article, I encourage you to check it out.