.FLYINGHEAD PRODUCT SHOOT-OUT
.TITLE Tip Calculators
.AUTHOR Jim DeLaHunt
.SUMMARY What makes a good restaurant tip calculator? Several different pieces of software are available to help with this little chore. We’re going to look at all of them, and see how they stack up.
The dinner was delicious, the service excellent, the conversation lively. It didn’t take long for you to tell your companions all about the PalmPilot organizer, and how you were using it at work and at home. One diner is so excited, he wants to buy your precious PalmPilot on the spot! And then the waiter brings the bill. How much does each person owe?
You need to check the bill, figure the tip, and round off the total so that you can split the expenses fairly.
This is a PalmPilot moment, a chance to whip out your organizer and show how it can make your life easier. What software should you use?
.H1 What makes a good tip calculator?
It turns out that several different pieces of software are available to help with this little chore. We’re going to look at all of them, and see how they stack up. But first, let’s consider what makes a good tip calculator.
Calculating tips is not rocket science. You’ve been doing it for years in your head. There are many little tricks to help out. In my area, where the sales tax rate is a whopping 8.25%, you can figure a 15% tip simply by doubling the tax amount and rounding off. So, any good tip calculator will have to be really fast and really simple if it’s going to improve on these rules of thumb. In practice, this boils down to letting you enter just a few numbers and stylus taps, and filling the rest in by itself.
The tip should be based on the total of food and drink before taxes. So, the tip calculator should compute tax and tip separately, but sum them for you.
Tips can and should differ according to the service you received. So, the tip calculator should make it easy to adjust the tip level up and down.
When paying cash, it’s often easier to round the total up or down to a convenient amount. The tip calculator should make that easy, and show you how the tip rate changed with the rounding off.
The PalmPilot organizer lets you set your preferences for number formats. A German user may want to see their totals as DM 123,45, while a Canadian would prefer $123.45. A good tip calculator should reflect your preferred formats and currency. It should also be available in your preferred language.
When you dine with friends, you might want to split the bill between you. A tip calculator can help with this task. A really good one could help you figure out how much more or less specific diners should pay, depending on what they ordered.
.H1 How we chose the software
For this survey, we picked the tip calculation software readily available on the Internet. We went to a popular PalmPilot software sites, PilotGear H.Q. at http://www.pilotgear.com/, and searched for all software that mentioned "tip". We included the most recent version of each application in this survey. We didn’t find any commercially-distributed tip calculators (though one of these is on a commercial CD-ROM).
One application that I caught in my net looked interesting, but didn’t really fit into the shoot-out. Traveler 1.6, shareware by Bill Ezell, available from http://www.mv.com/users/wje/pilot.html, is aimed at international travelers who need to convert currencies and time zones. While you can easily set it up to calculate tips, it isn’t really intended for that, and has a number of rough edges.
Another application that doesn’t quite fit is Go Dutch! 0.5, a freeware application by Shuji Fukumoto. This application addresses Japanese dining situations, where tipping isn’t an issue (you rarely tip in Japan) but does have clever help for splitting the bill among the diners and collecting the money. I’ve included it in the survey anyhow, since it is an innovative contrast.
.H1 The PalmPilot’s built-in calculator
Like I said, calculating tips isn’t rocket science. If you can calculate tips in your head, that’s probably the cheapest, simplest way. Or, you can take advantage of the PalmPilot organizer’s built-in calculator. This can compute the tip amount for you. What it won’t do is:
.BEGIN_LIST
.BULLET Subtract out the tax, if you are given only a total including tax;
.END_LIST
.BEGIN_LIST
.BULLET Round off the amount
.END_LIST
.BEGIN_LIST
.BULLET Help you easily experiment with different tip levels
.END_LIST
So, now we know what we’re looking for, on with the show!
.H1 TipMaster
Tip Master 1.5 is a US$7 shareware application by Andy Sackheim. It provides a single, clear display, which shows the tax, the tip, and the running totals. You can see this display in Figure A. This figure is a little out of date, since the most recent version has convenient up and down arrows for rounding off the total. As you adjust the total, the tip amount and percentage follow. Finally, you can enter in a number of persons, and see total divide evenly among that number. It’s not clear why the number of persons has a decimal point, since the digits after the decimal appear to be ignored. There isn’t a way to adjust what individuals pay; it’s one rate for everyone.
.FIG A TipMaster provides a clear and easy-to-understand display.
Unfortunately, TipMaster appears oblivious to currency and number formatting preferences. Even if you want to see BF 123,45, TipMaster will show you $123.45.
TipMaster arrives as a .ZIP archive with the application and a simple but clear text file of instructions. Instructions are also available from a menu, but they aren’t quite up-to-date and have some awkward formatting. However, the documentation is quite sufficient for such a straight-forward application. The documentation and the application are available only in English.
.H1 Quick Tip
QuickTip 1.0 is a $7 shareware application by Brad Cleveland. It’s support for global diners is outstanding; it displays the currency and number formatting right as specified in the preferences. I was impressed to see my 123,45 Belgian Francs listed flawlessly.
It provides solid computation of tax and tip. There are two displays. In Figure B, you can see how the main display is laid out. There are little menus which let you see and enter the meal total with or without tax, and either the tax rate or amount. There is an alternate display which shows you all fields at once, at the cost of a little more crowding and the loss of the title bar at the top of the screen. Even though you can switch back and forth easily, I found this dual display a little confusing.
.FIG B The main of QuickTip’s two alternate displays.
There is an easy way to split the bill between a number of diners. However, there’s no easy way to round the total up or down, so I found it harder to split the bill effectively. I found myself missing TipMaster’s little arrows.
QuickTip arrives as a .ZIP archive, with well-written documentation and clear, concise help screens. Both documentation and application are available in English only.
.H1 Big Tipper
Big Tipper 1.0 is a $5 shareware application by River Rock Sight & Sound. It’s the simple, unassuming member of the bunch. As you can see from it’s display in Figure C, it’s quite simple. Big Tipper leaves out confirming the sales tax amount, and as a result you end up paying tip on the sales tax amount. It will indeed nudge you into being a bigger tipper! Big Tipper is the only entry to do away with a "calculation" button; it updates totals as you enter them. This worked very well for me.
.FIG C Big Tipper is simple, and very straightforward, software.
Big Tipper provides one unique service: it has a screen which lets you rate the food quality, atmosphere, and service, and it will calculate a tip amount in the 0% to 24% range. I can imagine this helping encourage stingy tippers to pry their wallets a little wider. There doesn’t seem to be a way to set your own tip rates for each rating level, though.
Big Tipper makes no attempt to help you split the bill among diners. It comes with a modest on-line help menu, and the only documentation is a brief description on River Rock’s Web site. This simple program has the virtue of being easy, and truly self-explanatory. Both program and web site are in English only. The program is distributed in both .ZIP and Stuffit archive form.
The version of Big Tipper I evaluated was a shareware limited edition, which expired on 1. December 1997. Until they update the expiration date, you’ll need to set back your PalmPilot’s calendar or register the software in order to use Big Tipper.
.H1 GoDutch
GoDutch! 0.5 is freeware evaluation software from Shuji Fukumoto. This software reveals its Japanese origins right in its opening screen — as you can see in Figure D, there is no provision for calculating a tip (as I mentioned earlier, tipping is not common practice in Japan). Nor can you enter decimal points in the amounts.
There are two innovations, however, from which the other programs could learn a lesson. First, GoDutch! gives you more flexibility in splitting the bill. You can divide your party into groups, each of which pays at a different rate. In Figure D, five people are paying at 100% and three at 60%. The program does all the arithmetic and comes up with a total. This is a start at helping diners pay according to what they ordered.
.FIG D GoDutch! has a couple of innovations to help split the bill.
Second, there is a column of check marks, I assume to keep track of who has paid and who hasn’t. This is helpful when everyone is laying down money, and it’s gets confusing who still needs to chip in.
The version of GoDutch! I evaluated was a freeware evaluation release which expired on 31. July, 1997. That was four months ago; after so long, it’s not clear when it might be updated. To use this program, you’ll have to set your PalmPilot organizer’s clock back. The program comes only in English, and the only documentation is a note on the Web page in Japanese. It is distributed as a .ZIP archive.
.H1 Conclusions
It’s surprising that so many developers have stepped forward to help address this seemingly simple task. All four programs really do improve on the built-in calculator and rules of thumb. They each have special strengths to recommend them. QuickTip is great if you want displays in your own currency. Big Tipper is really simple and easy. GoDutch is interesting, and excellent if dining someplace where tips aren’t an issue.
For my money, the best all-round value for the money is TipMaster. It matches most of what the other programs do, and in a best-designed display. I believe it has a place in the library of anyone who dines out frequently, and enjoys using their PalmPilot organizer.
.BEGIN_SIDEBAR
.H1 Product availability
You can download all of these programs from the PilotGear site at http://www.pilotgear.com.
.END_SIDEBAR
.BIO
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