Re: Octave scripts in Mac OSX

[Daryl Lee]

On 6/29/2011 9:20 AM, John W. Eaton wrote:
> On 29-Jun-2011, Daryl Lee wrote:
>
> | I'm plowing my way through the newly released "GNU Octave for Beginners"
> | book, and I have run into a question that I think this group should be able
> | to answer.  I got to Chapter 4 and the section telling "GNU/Linux and MacOS
> | X users" how to add the shebang line to their script so it can be executed
> | from the bash shell.
> |
> | In Mac OSX, from the shell I type ($ is shell prompt)
> |
> | $ /Applications/Octave.app/Contents/Resources/bin/octave
> |
> | and get an Octave environment, as expected.  But when I write a script with
> | this as the first line:
> |
> | #! /Applications/Octave.app/Contents/Resources/bin/octave -qf
> |
> | set the permissions, and execute the script, I get a bash syntax error on
> | the first line of Octave script following the shebang line.  I've tried it
> | with and without the -qf.  It works as advertised on Linux, so I'm sure it's
> | a Mac OSX issue.
> |
> | What would be an effective way to launch Octave scripts from the Mac OS X
> | terminal command line?
>
> What's the error?

The error is simply "syntax error near unexpected '('" in the first line 
after the shebang line:

A = rand(3,4);

> Some systems have a too-small limit (like 16 or 32) on the number of
> characters that can be used in the name of the command.

Since Mac OS X terminal uses Bash as its shell, I'd not expect that.
> One workaround is to create a symbolic link or shell script somewhere
> else in the filesystem that will allow you to bypass the limit.

I had already tried the symlink idea.  So just typing "octave" at the 
command prompt brings up the octave environment.  But putting
/usr/local/bin/octave in the shebang line still fails.

> Another is to put Octave in your PATH and use something like
>
>    #! /usr/bin/env octave

Ta-da!  Thanks.

> except then you probably won't be able to pass options in addition to
> the command name.  If you need to do that, then you can use a wrapper
> shell script that calls Octave with the options.
>
> BTW, I don't think Octave can fix any of these problems.  They are all
> limitations of the OS.

I was pretty sure it isn't Octave's problem.  But I was also pretty sure 
that I'm not the first person on the mailing list to want to do this.  Maybe 
I am!

> jwe

--
Daryl Lee
www.daryllee.com
The unexamined life is not worth living. -- Socrates
The unlived life is not worth examining. -- Unknown