[Feature Request] Add currency converter or add plugin support

[ThsUsr]

It would be nice to add at least very basic support for a simple currency converter or to add plugin support. Below is an example of a plugin for Flow Launcher, as well as an example of an API, which is good because it provides 1,000 free requests per month (usually sufficient, and you could use much less with proper caching), and it also supports almost all currencies in the world. Alternatively, you could add plugin support, so this could be implemented through plugins.

Example plugin - https://github.com/SweedXD/CurrencyPP
Example API - https://openexchangerates.org

[vaxerski]

you can do currency conversions with qalculate, but I assume they aren't live pulled from the interwebz.

[abenz1267]

You'd simply run qalc -e "1+1" to update the exchange rates for libqalculate.

[vaxerski]

how does it update them? Does it pull them from the interwebz?

[abenz1267]

yes.

[ThsUsr]

you can do currency conversions with qalculate, but I assume they aren't live pulled from the interwebz.

Thanks, i didn't know about this feature, however, it does not cache the results and requests the data every time the program runs, even if it was requested a minute ago, and it does not support round or any other operations or functions with the conversion results. But wouldn't it be easier to implement this feature through libqalculate, offloading all the complexities of working with the API and processing onto it? That would greatly simplify the task if you still decide to implement this feature, providing a more native and direct experience of it in the launcher.

[vaxerski]

why would you need a results cache...?

[ThsUsr]

why would you need a results cache...?

Do not cache results - instead, cache only the latest exchange rate. libqalculate updates the exchange rates of all currencies before each query, whereas qalculate does this at each program start (at the time of the first request). This is a fairly heavy query and takes time, as it updates the rates of all currencies, including both fiat currencies and cryptocurrencies, every time. It is not the fastest operation or query. There is no point in executing this request every time, as it introduces unnecessary lag.

[vaxerski]

I'm pretty sure we only gather them once.

hyprlauncher/src/finders/math/MathFinder.cpp

Lines 36 to 51 in 3a023f4

	std::vector<SFinderResult> CMathFinder::getResultsForQuery(const std::string& query) {
	if (!qalculator) {
	qalculator = makeUnique<Calculator>();
	qalculator->loadExchangeRates();
	qalculator->loadGlobalDefinitions();
	qalculator->loadLocalDefinitions();
	}
	SFinderResult result;
	auto entry = makeShared<CMathEntry>();
	entry->m_expr = query;
	entry->m_result = qalculator->calculateAndPrint(query, 1500);
	result.result = entry;
	result.label = "= " + entry->m_result;
	return {result};
	}