xabacus - Abacus X widget

xabacus [-geometry [{width}][x{height}][{+-}{xoff}[{+-}{yoff}]]] [-display [{host}]:[{vs}]] [-[no]mono] [-[no]{reverse|rv}] [-{foreground|fg} {color}] [-{background|bg} {color}] [-{border|bd} {color}] [-frame {color}] [-rail {color}] [-bead {color}] [-rails {int}] [-[no]slot] [-[no]diamond] [-[no]vertical] [-{chinese|japanese|korean|roman|russian}] [-base {int}] [-displayBase {int}] [-[no]romanNumerals] [-[no]sign] [-[no]quarter] [-tnumber {int}] [-bnumber {int}] [-tfactor {int}] [-bfactor {int}] [-tspaces {int}] [-bspaces {int}] [-[no]torient] [-[no]borient] [-delay msecs] [-[no]sound] [-bumpSound {filename}] [-moveSound {filename}] [-[no]demo] [-[no]script] [-demopath {path}] [-demofont {fontname}] [-demofg {color}] [-demobg {color}] [-version]

This is an implementation of the classic Chinese abacus (Saun-pan) which has its origins in the 12th century.

The device has two decks. Each deck, separated by a partition, normally has 13 rails on which are mounted beads. Each rail on the top deck contains 1 or 2 beads, and each rod on the bottom deck contains 4 or 5 beads. Each bead on the upper deck has a value of five, while each bead on the lower deck has value of one. Beads are considered counted, when moved towards the partition separating the decks, i.e. to add a value of one a bead in the bottom deck is moved up and to add a value of 5 a bead in the top deck is moved down.

The basic operations of the abacus are addition and subtraction. Multiplication can be done by mentally doing the multiplications while adding up the intermediate results. Division would be similar where the intermediate results are subtracted. There are techniques like using your thumb and forefinger which does not apply with mouse entry. Also with multiplication, one can carry out calculations on different parts of the abacus, here it is nice to have a long abacus.

The pre-WWII Japanese abacus (Soroban) (or Korean Supan) is similar to the Chinese abacus but has only one bead per rail on the top deck. The later Japanese abacus was further simplified to have only 4 beads per rail on the bottom deck.

The Roman hand-abacus predates the Chinese abacus and is very similar to the later Japanese abacus, but seems to have fallen out of use with the Fall of the Roman Empire (at least 3 are in existence). The Roman abaci are brass plates where the beads move in slots. In addition to the normal 7 columns of beads, they generally have 2 special columns on the right side. In two examples: the first special column was for 12ths (12 uncia (ounces) = 1 as) and had one extra bead in the bottom deck. Also the last column was a combination of halves, quarters, and thirds of an ounce and had no slot in the top deck and 4 beads at the bottom (beads did not have to come to the top to be counted but at one of 3 marked points where the top bead was for halves, 1 for quarters, and the bottom 2 for thirds). In another surviving example: the 2 special columns were switched and the combination column was broken into 3 separate slots.

The Russian abacus was invented in the 17th century, here the beads are moved from right to left (currently the xabacus can not be oriented that way and one has to move the beads down). It has colored beads in the middle for ease of use. Quarters represent 1/4 Rubles and are only present historically on the Russian abacus (Schoty). Some of the older Schoty have a extra place for the 1/4 Kopek (quarter percent) as well as the 1/4 Ruble (quarter).

The signed bead is an invention of the author and is not present on any historical abacus (to his knowledge) and is used to represent negatives. "New & Improved" abacus models have two auxiliary decks stacked above the principal deck that enable multiplication, division, square-root, and cube-root computations to be performed with equal ease as addition and subtraction.

Click "mouse-left" button on a bead you want to move. The beads will shift themselves to vacate the row and column that was clicked.

Click "mouse-right" button, or press "C" or "c" keys, to clear the abacus.

Press "O" or "o" keys to toggle the demo mode.

Press "I" or "i" keys to increment the number of rails.

Press "D" or "d" keys to decrement the number of rails.

Press "F" or "f" keys to switch between Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Roman, and Russian formats.

Press "V" or "v" keys to toggle vertical Russian orientation.

Press "M" or "m" keys to toggle Roman Numerals.

Press "S" or "s" keys to toggle the availability of sign bead.

Press "U" or "u" keys to toggle the availability of quarter beads.

Press ">" or "." keys to speed up the movement of beads.

Press "<" or "," keys to slow down the movement of beads.

Press "@" key to toggle the sound.

Press "Esc" key to hide program.

Press "Q", "q", or "CTRL-C" keys to kill program.

The abacus may be resized. Beads will reshape depending on the room they have. Demo Mode: In this mode, the abacus is controlled by the program. When started with the demo option, a second window is presented that should be placed directly below the abacus-window. Descriptive text, and user prompts are displayed in this window. Pressing 'q' during the demo will quit it. Clicking the left mouse-button with the pointer in the window will restart the demo (beginning of current lesson).

-geometry {+|-}X{+|-}Y

This option sets the initial position of the abacus window (resource name "geometry").

-display host:dpy

This option specifies the X server to contact.

-[no]mono

This option allows you to display on a color screen as if monochrome (resource name "mono").

-[no]{reverse|rv}

This option allows you to see the abacus window in reverse video (resource name "reverse").

-{foreground|fg} color

This option specifies the foreground of the abacus window (resource name "foreground").

-{background|bg} color

This option specifies the background of the abacus window (resource name "background").

-{border|bd} color

This option specifies the foreground of the border of the beads (resource name "borderColor").

-frame color

This option specifies the foreground of the frame (resource name "frameColor").

-rail color

This option specifies the foreground of the rails (resource name "railColor").

-bead color

This option specifies the foreground of the beads (resource name "beadColor").

-rails int

This option specifies the number of rails (resource name "rails").

-[no]slot

This option allows you to have either slots or rails (resource name "slot").

-[no]diamond

This option allows you to have either diamond or round beads (resource name "diamond").

-chinese

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Chinese" for the Chinese Saun-pan.

-japanese

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Japanese" for the Japanese post-WWII Soroban. This is also similar to the Roman Hand Abacus.

-korean

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Korean" for the Korean Supan or Japanese pre-WWII Soroban.

-roman

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Roman" for the Roman Hand Abacus, note beads move in slots. To complete, specify romanNumerals".

-russian

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Russian" for the Russian Schoty. To complete, specify quarter".

-other

This option specifies the format on the abacus (resource name "format") to "Other". This option specifies a format that is more configurable by using resources, since there are few rules to govern its behavior.

-base int

This option specifies the base used on abacus (default is base 10) (resource name "base"). By default, one has to set the format mode to not be Other for this to work (unless you know what you are doing).

-displayBase int

This option specifies the base displayed (default is base 10) (resource name "displayBase"). If this is different then "base" then it is implemented using "long long" and the calculation is limited by its bounds. Also the fractional part does not scale with the "displayBase" so if the "displayBase" is greater than the "base" it looses some precision. Also no rounding is done.

-[no]vertical

This option allows you to set the abacus to allow a Russian orientation (resource name "vertical").

-[no]romanNumerals

This option allows you to set the abacus to allow Roman Numerals (resource name "romanNumerals"). Roman Numerals above 3999 are normally represented with bars on top, due to ASCII constraints this is represented instead in lower case (historically case was ignored). Roman Numerals above 3,999,999 were not represented historically. Roman numerals change with displayBase in an "experimental" way.

-[no]sign

This option allows you to set the abacus to allow negatives (resource name "sign").

-[no]quarter

This option allows you to set the abacus to allow quarters (resource name "quarter").

-tnumber int

This option specifies the number of beads on top (resource name "topNumber").

-bnumber int

This option specifies the number of beads on bottom (resource name "bottomNumber").

-tfactor int

This option specifies the multiply factor for the beads on top (resource name "topFactor").

-bfactor int

This option specifies the multiply factor for the beads on bottom (resource name "bottomFactor").

-tspaces int

This option specifies the number of spaces on top (resource name "topSpaces").

-bspaces int

This option specifies the number of spaces on bottom (resource name "bottomSpaces").

-[no]torient

This option specifies the orientation of the beads on top (resource name "topOrient").

-[no]borient

This option specifies the orientation of the beads on bottom (resource name "bottomOrient").

-delay msecs

This option specifies the number of milliseconds it takes to move a bead or a group of beads one space (resource name "delay").

-[no]sound

This option specifies if a sliding bead should make a sound or not (resource name "sound").

-bumpSound filename

This option specifies the file for the bump sound (resource name "bumpSound").

-moveSound filename

This option specifies the file for the move sound (resource name "moveSound").

-[no]demo

This option specifies to run in demo mode. In this mode, the abacus is controlled by the current lesson (resource name "demo"). When started with the demo option, a window contains descriptive text, and user prompts are displayed in this window. Pressing 'q' during the demo will quit it. Clicking the left mouse-button with the pointer in the window will restart the demo (beginning of current lesson). The demo uses Abacus1.les for the first Chinese Abacus lesson, Abacusjp1.les for the first Japanese (and Roman) Abacus lesson, Abacusko1.les for the Korean Abacus, and Abacusru1.les for the Russian Abacus.

-[no]script

This option specifies to log application to stdout, every time the user clicks to move the beads (resource name "script"). The output is a set of deck, rail, beads added or subtracted, and the number of text lines (4). This can be edited to add text to the lesson and used as a new demo keeping the generated numbers and the number of lines constant. If you want to add a "do nothing", the first line generated is an example of that. For example: "xabacus -script > Abacus5.les"

-demopath path

This option specifies the path for the demo, possibly something like /usr/share/games/xabacus (resource name "demoPath"). It initially looks for Abacus1.les. If it finds that, it will later look for Abacus2.les, etc.

-demofont fontstring

This option specifies the font for the explanatory text that appears in the secondary window, during the demo. The default font is 18 point Times-Roman (-*-times-*-r-*-*-*-180-*). The alternate font is 8x13.

-demofg color

This option specifies the foreground of the abacus demo window (resource name "demoForeground").

-demobg color

This option specifies the background of the abacus demo window (resource name "demoBackground").

-version

This option tells you what version of xabacus you have.

Luis Fernandes http://www.ee.ryerson.ca/~elf/abacus/ Lee Kai-chen, How to Learn Lee's Abacus, 1958, 58 pages. Abacus Guide Book, 57 pages. Georges Ifrah, The Universal History of Numbers, Wiley Press 2000, pp 209-211, 288-294. Review of the above: http://www.ams.org/notices/200201/rev-dauben.pdf David Eugene Smith, History of Mathematics Volume II, Dover Publications, Inc 1958, pp 156-195.n"

X(1), xrubik(6), xskewb(6), xdino(6), xpyraminx(6), xoct(6), xmball(6), xmlink(6), xpanex(6), xcubes(6), xtriangles(6), xhexagons(6)

® Copyright 1994-2005, David Albert Bagley

Luis Fernandes, <elf@ee.ryerson.ca> wrote an independent program (xabacus 1.00) with a demo mode and postscript file. I tried, with his permission, to take the best features of both into one program. Also I had help with some of the abacus in the Java version by Sarat Chandran, <aratcmahadevan@yahoo.com> and some of these ideas were ported back into this X version.

Send bugs (or their reports, or fixes) to the author: David Albert Bagley, <bagleyd@tux.org> The latest version is currently at: ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/tux/bagleyd/xabacus

ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/apps/math