The fast-moving world we live in compels us to pay more and more attention to our wellbeing and this is due to the ever-increasing stress and pollution we are exposed to on a daily basis. The lack of physical exercise and poor alimentation contribute to the generation and propagation of health problems for individuals just as for entire communities. The first thing and perhaps the one most often at hand for everyone to do is fight the inactivity by working out. The exercise routines needn't be complicated, but well targeted to bring about relaxation and a feeling of relief from passivity and mental strain.

Nowadays, for most people, going to the gym and having a personal trainer is a pretty common practice that yields good results. For those interested in a bit more than that, for people who want to find out and understand more than the basic principles that are behind a good workout, there are quite a few things to be unveiled. This is usually done by accessing specialized websites, reading specific books in a hardback or digital format. For the latter part, there are also dedicated software products made for different levels of users and with various degrees of detailing.

Such a utility is the Fitness Calculator Module, a handy, freeware application that will help any user get an insight into the elementary parameters that have to be monitored by someone who works out or simply wants to monitor the health status. It is basically a suite of calculators that will enable one to learn useful things, like one's maximum heart rate or the body-mass index (BMI). The installation as well as the actual usage are straightforward, just as the interface. The calculators are organized in a tree-like structure in the left panel of the main window, while the right side is the area where the actual calculations will be done. The eye-candy ingredients are nowhere to be found if longed for, as are any buttons or functions other than those for inserting data and obtaining the instant result. In other words, you'll be faced with a tool that is bent on offering maximum practicality at the expense of eye-catching visuals.

Each of the listed modules displays in the right tab a short but essential explanation that will let you know what it's all about. Also, for each element where this is necessary, you'll be presented with the formula that is used for number crunching. The information is presented for every component in the help file, which is actually a PDF document you can access via the Help menu of the application, by pressing the Contents button.

The Fitness Calculator Module comes with two calculators for maximum and resting heart rate, a BMI-calculating facility, as well as one for the basal metabolic rate (BMR). Also for calorie measurement there is the TDEE calculator that shows the total daily energy expenditure or, more simply put, the number of calories your body will burn in a single day. The nutritional section is completed by a convenient instrument that can show you how many proteins you need every day for a sound growth. It is called Daily Protein Requirement or simply DPR.

This application comes bundled with two components especially designed to show you the healthy-weight range based on your height and a grid that gives you a few guidelines for learning the ideal fat range. If you want more on this chapter, there's another subdivision happy to oblige, namely the lean body-mass calculator. This will enable you to determine the body weight after you exclude the fat percentage.

An interesting feature of this piece of software is the fact that each processed parameter that is part of the formula used for the computation of another one is automatically added. For example, if you used the dedicated tool for finding the BMR, it will be employed by default in the TDEE section. Besides the specialized means of assessing various health factors, the Fitness Calculator Module offers you, as a bonus, a metric-conversion utility. It will allow you to convert centimeters, feet, grams, inches, kilograms, meters and pounds with great ease.

The Good

This utility offers a nice variety of calculators that addresses several areas of interest insofar as the health parameters are concerned. It also offers valuable information about each module so that anyone will understand the definition of the accessed feature. The operation is a breeze and the footprint on system resources almost unnoticeable.

The Bad

Something you'll notice right after the installation is the complete lack of a personalized desktop icon for the Fitness Calculator Module, which uses the default symbol for an executable instead of showing at least the one displayed in the title bar.

The plain and unattractive interface takes off some points and, still on the downside, there is a deficiency in terms of features, namely a lack of fitness-specific functions. It would have been great to have things like a calculator for burned calories per workout, or a graph that would display the progress that results from sustained physical exercise.

The Truth

All things considered, it's safe to say that this piece of software offers a good package of tools that are usually encountered individually, not assembled in a suite. The data it offers is very useful for assessing and tracking the progress in improving one's health and physical condition as well. There is, undoubtedly, plenty of room for improvement, but, being a freebie, the Fitness Calculator Module brings a lot of value, as there are too few similar apps that can compete with it, as you will see if you give it a try.

Here are some snapshots of the application in action: