Re: how to install OCTAVE in windows XP

[Quentin Spencer]

John W. Eaton wrote:

> On  4-Jan-2006, Quentin Spencer wrote:
>
> | That certainly seems to be what people want. Even with an up-to-date 
> | cygwin release out there, downloads of the 2 1/2 year old 2.1.50 windows 
> | binary hit an all-time high in November, according to the download stats 
> | page:
>
> But doesn't this version also depend on the Cygwin DLL?  So people
> don't really care whether it is Cygwin based.  They just don't want to
> know about it.

Yes, that's my assessment. I think some Windows users without previous 
exposure to Unix/Linux are a bit confused by cygwin. I received an 
off-list reply to my earlier e-mail that seemed to equate installing 
cygwin with compiling from source. I also think part of the problem is 
people don't know where to go to get octave for windows (though it is 
mentioned on the download page of octave.org). The first result when you 
search "octave windows" in google is the matlinks sourceforge project, a 
long-inactave project that is home of a windows binary dating to 2002 
that is even older than the infamous 2.1.50a binary. Its download 
statistics show that as recently as November it was averaging 1500 
downloads a month. That would explain where the occaisional 
2.1.40-something bug reports come from. I'm not sure how else to get the 
word out about the cygwin octave binaries, but maybe updating the FAQ 
page would help.

-Quentin




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