Re: Octave/Win32 new binary package (2.9.12)

[Olli Saarela]

Hello,

> A new binary package of Octave for Win32, based on 2.9.12 is available on
> http://www.dbateman.org/?page=octave&lang=EN.

I quickly tried this on two Windows machines.

1. Windows XP SP 2

The package installed without any problems. I ran a couple of my old 
scripts, and they worked perfectly.

Some observations though:

1a) Zooming with mouse (rubberband with left button & click with right)
seems to always operate on the last subplot, no matter which subplot
you click. This can be tested with
subplot(311);plot(rand(5,1));subplot(312);plot(rand(5,1));subplot(313);plot(rand(5,1))

1b) The edit command tries to create a new file to 
fullfile(default_home, "octave"), even though
the directory doesn't exist
octave.exe:32> edit new_file.m
error: edit: could not create C:\Ojs\octave\new_file.m

1c) Handling of national characters. If I have a directory named lämpötila
(containing an a umlaut and an o umlaut), the command prompt in Console 
shows it in the Windows fashion (correct national characters):
C:\tmp\test>dir /b
lämpötila
but Octave in a Console window shows it in the ms-dos style:
octave.exe:22> dir
.              ..             lSmp÷tila
(an uppercase sigma in place of the a umlaut and a division symbol in 
place of the o umlaut).

Octave doesn't react to hitting the national character keys on the 
keyboard. In order to chdir to that subdirectory I have to create an 
m-file containing the cd command. Proper handling of national
characters in Octave might be a larger project, though. The data type 
used is signed 8-bit which cannot hold the necessary codes:
octave.exe:23> double(char(246))
ans = -10
This should return 246 (the code for letter ö).


2. Windows Vista, relatively new setup without too many programs installed

The package installed without any problems. However, when trying to run, 
the Console window doesn't show any output from Octave. Opening a new 
Octave tab in Console shows an error message:

error: unable to find Java Runtime Environment
error: called from `javaaddpath' in file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\packages\java-1.0.1\javaaddpath.m'
error: evaluating if command near line 1, column 1
error: near line 22 of file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\packages\oplot-gl-0.2.0\PKG_ADD'
error: source: error sourcing file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\packages\oplot-gl-0.2.0\PKG_ADD'
error: evaluating if command near line 1549, column 3
error: called from `pkg:load_packages' in file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\2.9.12\m\pkg\pkg.m'
error: evaluating switch command near line 215, column 3
error: called from `pkg' in file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\2.9.12\m\pkg\pkg.m'
error: near line 2 of file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\2.9.12\m\pkg\PKG_ADD'
error: source: error sourcing file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\2.9.12\m\pkg\PKG_ADD'
error: near line 16 of file `C:\Program Files\Octave 
2.9.12-2\share\octave\2.9.12\m\startup/octaverc'
octave.exe:1>


Is there any particular operation you want tested?

Regards,
  Olli