Wolfram Alpha; you type your input or question and it produces a result. It sounds rather simple put in those words, but simply, that is what it does. It's the +10 trillion pieces of data it has in it's knowledge base that makes it rather complex.
Unlike search engine main-players Google and Yahoo, Wolfram sets out to find you the information you need, not the websites you want. For example you can type in any mathematical algorithm and it will calculate it instantaneously. This is a direct result of 20 years of research by Wolfram building their own programming code named 'Mathematica' which is run on super computers.
But it doesn't stop with algorithms. Wolfram has access to almost limitless numerical data on whatever you want. Want to know how many people live in the small province of Bam in the south of Iran? 99,268. Want to know the thermal conductivity of the element Boron? 27W/(mk) Want to know the standard frequency of the musical note F-sharp? 369.994 Hertz. The amount of information is incomprehensible, to say the least.
There is one thing that does worry me about Wolfram Alpha though. I foresee a future where parents can put there kids down in front of Wolfram Alpha to do a school project, and not have to worry that their kids project about 'Human Anatomy' will bring up scandalous image results like Google did back in their day.
I mean, it's great news for parents, but kids are going to HATE it.
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