Re: tempname vs. tmpnam

[Daniel J Sebald]

On 10/22/2014 12:50 PM, Rik wrote:
> 10/22/14
>
> All,
>
> I checked in a changeset which moves all of core Octave to using tempname
> (http://hg.savannah.gnu.org/hgweb/octave/rev/6ca096827123).
>
> It doesn't actually deprecate tmpnam, but it removes it from seealso links
> in the documentation and from the manual.  If you type 'help tmpnam' it
> returns a help string which mentions that tempname is preferred in new code.
>
> Eventually we may fully deprecate it, but not for a while.

What about "tmpfile"?  It seems odd to have "tempname", "tempdir" and 
then "tmpfile".  But I could see keeping "tmpfile" if there is a clear 
explanation as to why it should be that way.  "tmpfile" is similar to 
"tempname" with the extra step of actually opening the file...but not 
quite the same.  "tmpfile" does not have the option of a DIR so does 
that mean that files from "tmpfile" reside in the "/tmp" directory?  Is 
that justification for calling it "tmpfile"?  Options would be

1) Leave as is, with perhaps an explanation for why "tmp" rather than 
"temp".

2) Similar to "tmpnam"/"tempname", rename to "tempfile" and deprecate 
"tmpfile".

3) Create a "tempfile" perhaps having the same input options as 
"tempname" (and probably consist of calling tempname() and then adding a 
few lines of code to attempt opening the file).  Rename "tmpfile" to 
"P_tmpfile".

??

Dan