# Is there a way to copy/paste an expression from Mathematica into Wolfram Alpha?

For example, I have the expression

$$\int_0^t \frac{\lambda e^{-\lambda x} (\lambda x)^{k-1}}{(k-1)!} \, dx$$

(written that way in Mathematica). Is there a simple way to copy/paste the (in this case) integral into Wolfram Alpha to have it solve it? Or should I instead write the expression in Mathematica language directly, i.e. Integrate[] instead of $$\int$$?

• I would be a good thing if you were to tell us more about what you are trying to accomplish. In particular, when say you copying, what kind of notebook cell are copying from? Where are you pasting? Into a web browser page? Why do you need to send the integral to W|A, when you could just evaluate it in Mathemtica? Dec 20 '19 at 6:01
• Sometimes Mathematica will not evaluate the integral whereas WA will. Also, WA gives a detailed page of properties of your expression, which Mathematica does not do. I am copying from a regular notebook in Mathematica, and pasting into the standard box on wolframalpha.com Dec 20 '19 at 6:07
• I presume you know you can send you integral to W|A directly from your notebook, so why aren't you doing that? Dec 20 '19 at 6:14
• @m_goldberg I tried that and got this: i.imgur.com/u4h2Vtr.png Dec 20 '19 at 6:17

I tried this

and got this from W|A

So maybe adding the word "evaluate" before your integral expression is all you have to do.

### Update

The following is added to address a concern raised by the OP in a comment to this answer.

That's weird. Here is alternatives that I tried that surprisingly worked and indicates that you have encountered a bug in W|A.

Starting with the input form

I used the notebook Copy As > MathML command and then pasted the MathML into a W|A query.

I executed this rather strange look query and got back

• This doesn't seem to work with definite integrals: i.imgur.com/At93Ssk.png Dec 20 '19 at 6:50

Use InputForm of the integrand and copy/paste in WA adding Integrate.

Have a look here for the antiderivative.

• It seems to only work for indefinite integrals. Is there a way to get this to work for definite integrals? Dec 20 '19 at 11:17
• @Math1000. Is eems that you are right. No idea. If you get an answer, please ping me. Cheers. Dec 20 '19 at 11:22