I find it very convenient to use the CL/ECL shell as a calculator and would like to do the same in Pyraf, having recently started learning some Python. By creating a .python file with "from math import *", I can get Pyraf to do nearly everything the CL does, just without the "=" sign. One thing that is missing, however, is the ability to type an RA/Dec in sexagesimal format, along the lines of "=15*(2:40-2:20)*cos(-12:2:24*PI/180.0)" or whatever.
I see that Pyraf has some functions for converting sexagesimal numbers - for instance I can use 'iraf.real("-12:2:24")' and I see that ticket #21 mentions another sexagesimal function. Still, the IRAF syntax is much easier. I don't really know whether that could be dealt with in the Pyraf shell or whether it's a question of adding operators to Python, so I'm not sure if it's a reasonable request - but it would be nice to have :-).
Just a personal thing...
Thanks,
James.