Re: policy for release branch

[Daniel J Sebald]

Robert T. Short wrote:
> Well, now.  Make a list of things octave does better.  Send that to The 
> Mathworks
> as a feature request.  *If* they decide they care, MATLAB will do all of those 
> things
> and more by the next release.  They have resources that we don't.

In the macroscopic view, I see your point.  Matlab covers much more ground than 
Octave.  However, I often feel more proficient when working in Octave.  A lot 
of Matlab's perceived advantage is due to a lot of features that sometimes seem 
of questionable benefit; and the fact that people are enamored with GUIs (GUIs 
have their place, yes).

For example, the default for Matlab is to not print the contents of an array if the array 
size is too large.  I suppose viewing data is what the GUI based "variables 
window" is for.  But one has to double click 3 or 4 times to get to a spread 
sheet-like view of the data desired--whew.  In Octave, the data is displayed in a pager 
no matter the quantity requested, a pager which allows easy searching.

Users denounce gnuplot, but in my opinion Octave w/ gnuplot offers far more 
versatility as far as graphics output formats.  Gnuplot plots have just as nice 
appearance compared to those from Matlab.  Matlab plotting has its own quirks 
as far as layout, etc.  Also, if one is running a lengthy simulation or 
whatnot, the Octave/gnuplot plots can be examine while the Octave is still 
running.  That doesn't work so well in Matlab.


>   EVERY OTHER
> PERSON in that initial group has stayed with MATLAB because they don't have
> to build from source, they can buy toolboxes that are uniformly reliable, they
> don't have to worry about crashes, etc., etc.

Matlab hangs on occassion.  Actually, it is probably a Windows issue, but hey.

Octave became very robust about five years ago.  John always seemed to put 
crash bugs at top priority when they were reported, and I think he gradually 
did some code restructuring and improvement.


> My contributions took months, but were really minor.  I did hold the
> release up for a week or two right at the very end (actually, I REQUESTED
> that we hold up for a week or two), but it was for a couple of quick but
> very important items - important, given that everything else was in place.

No biggy in the grand scheme of things.

Dan