se the API, you must first request a WolframAlpha API application ID http://www.wolframalpha.com/apiapplication.html
Like any new piece of software, not all users are satisfied with the features and usability of the WolframAlpha product. CNET did a poll of its readers shortly after WolframAlpha was released in May 2009. Asked to judge how happy they were with the outcome of their searches, readers gave Wolfram Alpha an average score of 3.55, with 1 being "most satisfied" and 5 being least.
WolframAlpha is something entirely new – it doesn’t replace Google, but complements it. With subsequent releases, it is likely to become an integral web component.
Based on a small sample of 1,459 responses, the CNET report concludes that, “readers were dissatisfied with Wolfram Alpha’s ability to produce results for anything outside of a relatively narrow set of queries related to math, science, or statistics. Forty percent said they would not recommend Wolfram Alpha to friends, while 28 percent thought it was only appropriate for ‘serious data nerds.’”
It‘s likely that a similar poll – if conducted using a sample of scientists, mathematicians and engineers – would yield significantly different (and much more favorable) results. This isn’t surprising given that parent company Wolfram Research is the developer of Mathematica – heavily used by universities and scientific research facilities. The company has many experts in sophisticated math and science topics, so you’d expect that results for those types of queries produce far more useful answers.
WolframAlpha is something entirely new – it doesn’t replace Google, but complements it. With subsequent releases and a growing database, it is likely to become an integral web component in computational research and analysis.