QuickMath is a new tweak that allows you to do simple math functions within iOS search. If you’re a Mac user you’re probably already use to this kind of functionality within Spotlight. I’ve definitely caught myself a time or two swiping to search on my iPhone to do a simple math problem and quickly realizing that I can’t.

Once you install QuickMath there is nothing to configure. Just swipe on over to search and type in your math problem. Hit search and the solution will show up in the search bar. It’s a bit quicker than searching or paging through for the Calculator app in my experience. Maybe this math tweak will be enough to make Leanna jump over to #TeamJailbreak?

QuickMath is available in Cydia for free.

[Free - Cydia Search Link]

Calcbot is a universal calculator application for iPad and iPhone. It is a basic scientific calculator but is designed well with big buttons and tape. For this review, we will be focusing on the iPad version.

In landscape, you will find the calculator on the left and tape on the right. The calculator has two pages of buttons which keeps them nice and big. Just swipe the calculator to the left to bring the next page of functions. The first page is primarily numbers and basic operators as well as power and root functions. The second page contains a more functions such at the specific powers of 2 and 3, square root, factorial, log, natural logarithm, exponential, and trigonometric functions. Tapping the shift key (up arrow) will change the trigonometric functions to their inverses. Calcbot lets you chose between radians and degrees as well. The second page does not include an equal sign. This is annoying because a calculation does not appear on the tape until the equal sign is tapped.

If you want to re-enter a calculation from the tape, just tap the desired calculation and a menu pops up to use result, use expression, copy, send in email, or delete. You can also swipe to delete any expression. To email or clear the entire tape, tap the wheel in the upper right hand corner. If you’re not interested in seeing the tape, rotate to portrait mode to view only the calculator.

Calcbot is an excellent little calculator app that looks and works great. There is nothing fancy about it, but that’s part of it’s appeal. Calcbot is strait-forward and to the point which makes it easy and intuitive to use. Simply put, Calcbot is another visually appealing and terrifically designed app by Tapbots.

Screenshots after the break!

[$0.99 - iTunes link]

Pros

• Simple and effective calculator
• Email and access calculations from tape
• Swipe to access more functions. This keeps the calculator buttons nice and big.

Cons

• Must hit equal sign for calculation to appear on tape. It would be nice to have equal sign available on both screens.

Unlike the iPhone 3GS, the iPad doesn’t have built-in stocks, weather, voice memo, clock, calculator, or compass apps. It does, however, have the brand new iPad App Store, and yeah… there are apps for all that!

Check out our picks after the break!

Bloomberg for iPad [Free - iTunes link] offers not just stocks but news, company info, price charts, trends, analysis and… you get the idea. It could just be information overload on a 9.7″ screen, but that’s likely just what you stockies want!

Weather Channel Max [Free - iTunes link] costs nothing (thanks to Toyota) but packs in the weathery-goodness. Full screen, customizable maps, in-motion radar, local, regional, and national video, and more make it not so much of a replacement as a escalation.

Voice memos for iPad [Free - iTunes link] is the “I can’t believe it’s not butter” of replacement apps. It looks similar to Apple’s iPhone Voice Memo app, but it’s scaled up to iPad size. Unlimited recording, tagging, pause, levels, timer, and email options make it a great fill in option.

Clock… We haven’t found a good replacement for Clock yet. If you know of one that matches the functionality and the grace of the iPhone Clock app, let us know in the comments. And developers — make a good one, with a great icon. Seriously.

PCalc Lite [Free - iTunes] or PCalc [$9.99 - iTunes link] make the iPhone calculator look anemic by comparison. It includes an optional RPN mode, multiple undo and redo, unit conversions and constants, a couple of themes, and much more in the paid version.

Compass HD + Vector Magnetometer / Gravitometer [Free for now - iTunes link] is an app that, frankly, we may not be smart enough to properly describe. It has absolute mode, north mode, declination mode, and relative modes, and a bunch of different display modes for acceleration visualization. Get it while it’s free!

So there you have it, App Store to the rescue! Did we miss any (other than clocks!)? Are there alternatives your like better? Let us know in the comments!

Daring Fireball‘s John Gruber suggests that bigger, iPad versions of the built-in iPhone Stocks, Calculator, Weather, Clock and Voice Memo were scrapped by Steve Jobs:

It’s not that Apple couldn’t just create bigger versions of these apps and have them run on the iPad. It wasn’t a technical problem, it was a design problem. There were, internally to Apple (of course), versions of these apps (or at least some of them) with upscaled iPad-sized graphics, but otherwise the same UI and layout as the iPhone versions. Ends up that just blowing up iPhone apps to fill the iPad screen looks and feels weird, even if you use higher-resolution graphics so that nothing looks pixelated. So they were scrapped by you-know-who.

Gruber was responding to theories that these apps would instead be offered as App Store downloads, or could be part of some secret widget dashboard implementation. In other words, that it’s a design issue, not a technical issue.

However, new UI that would make the iPad an amazing bedside clock (how’s that for a Lock Screen), or show Stocks with a variety of graphs and related news and data, or weather for several days and cities at once, certainly seems possible for Apple’s UI wizards. Perhaps they simply lacked time to re-do the apps for the already extended April 3 release date?

Perhaps they’ll appear on the iPad in some re-imagined form this summer with OS 4.0, but when the iPad ships next month, there won’t be versions of these apps. At least that’s the story I’ve heard from a few well-informed little birdies.

Speaking of which, any little birdies hear anything about an iPhone 4.0 sneak preview event yet? Or is everyone just focused on getting the iPad out right now?

UPDATE: Just so everyone is clear, the developer did this as a parody, Apple didn’t censor anything. B’okay? Read the full 8008135 story on Three Letter Acronym…

PCalc RPN Calculator [$9.99 - iTunes link] for iPhone has just updated to version 1.8, and the update is… rather unique:

Have you, or somebody close to you, ever turned your calculator upside down and accidentally seen a mildly suggestive word? Have you ever been in a maths class, and had to put up with groups of giggling boys performing elaborate calculations that are not part of the lesson?

Yes, it’s one of the main problems affecting the calculator industry today, the so-called “calculator words”. These otherwise harmless devices can be made to display smut at the press of a few buttons. Added to that, the iPhone App Store is very strict about having inappropriate content in apps. Nobody wants their app to get a 17+ rating, or worse, to be rejected entirely.

Which is why we are happy to announce that the latest version of our PCalc scientific calculator for the iPhone contains a new patent-worthy profanity filter.

Simply enter a number such as “5318008″, turn the calculator upside down, and the offending word will be discreetly censored. Many common calculator words have been included as standard, and we plan to increase this over time via software updates.

The new version also comes, you know, calculator features, and a $9 off coupon for the Mac version (which doesn’t seem to change when you turn your Mac upside down… hmmm… feature parity?!)

James Thomson wrote in to tell us about PCalc 1.7 [$9.99 - iTunes link], and as usual, the prose is almost as good as the app. Almost.

One year ago, as the doors of the iPhone App Store first opened to the public, PCalc was there. One of only four hundred applications available, and a mere handful of calculators. Now, there are more than sixty-five thousand applications in the store, and calculators are second only to Twitter clients in terms of near-pestilential ubiquitousness.

Metaphorgeddon aside, while we mentioned the new version already, after using it for the day, it was obvious it deserved a closer look. Here are the updates again:

• Faster startup!
• Three and four-line display modes, including complete control over what appears on each line.
• Multiple-memory support.
• Optional HP48-style RPN behaviour.
• Much nicer number display with the “Easier To Read” digits option. It’s now actually easier to read!

It is indeed. I’m not a mathmagician like Leanna, but this really is the built-in calculator on Hulk-serum. Check out the screenshots after the break, and if you give PCalc 1.7 a try, let us know what you think!

Macworld formulates word of HP’s foray into iPhone application development, and it’s both nostalgic for calculator enthusiasts, and interesting from a premium price point:

When run in landscape mode, each app uses the original ROM code and provides an exact visual replica of the actual horizontal-format calculator, making it familiar to users of the originals. The $15 HP 12c and $20 HP 12c Platinum provide the same business-focused functions and formulas as the hardware models, and the $30 HP 15c includes all of the original’s scientific algorithms and calculation sequences, including matrix, root, and complex-number functions. All three apps are also, like their hardware counterparts, programmable.

Here’s the rundown again:

• HP 12C Financial Calculator [$14.99 - iTunes link]
• HP 12C Platinum Calculator [$19.99 - pending]
• HP 15C Scientific Calculator [$29.99 - iTunes link]

Anyone compelled to pick up one of those heavy crunchers, and if so, which one, what makes it compelling, and does it feel enough like the hardware version for you?

Engadget honcho Ryan Block got his techie mitts on a pre-release version of the iPhone 2.0 firmware, and here are the highlights (and lowlights!):

Exchange over Wi-Fi is not instantaneous (!). No contact search he could find. New button in Calendar don’t do nothing for him yet. App Store error’s out. Cisco branded VPN screen. Parental controls are good-to-go. Wi-Fi order can be specified in prefs. Calc has new widescreen scientific mode and icon. And his favorite new feature — Multi-Select in Mail!

Head on over for a full rundown and gallery o’ pics!