Problem with exist

[Andy Adler]

I'm having a problem with exist().

If foo.m is currently loaded then
exist('foo.anything') is true, regardless
of whether the file exists.

This is a problem, because my code does

function out=foo();
   if exist('foo.mat');
      load('foo.mat');
   else
      out=calculate_out();
      save('foo.mat',out);
   end

This example shows the problem

$ cat > foo.m
function x=foo(y); x=y+1; endfunction;

$ octave -q
octave:1> exist('foo')
ans = 2
octave:2> exist('foo.mat')
ans = 0
octave:3> foo(1);
octave:4> exist('foo')
ans = 2
octave:5> exist('foo.mat')
ans = 2
octave:6> exist('foo.anything')
ans = 2

Andy