Re: core, matlab, & OF name conflicts [Was: strsplit needs an update]

[Richard Crozier]

On 31/03/2013 15:28, Ben Abbott wrote:
> On Mar 31, 2013, at 9:05 AM, Ben Abbott wrote:
>
> > On Mar 31, 2013, at 7:53 AM, Carnë Draug wrote:
> >
> > > On 30 March 2013 15:50, Ben Abbott <address@hidden> wrote:
> > >
> > > > On Mar 27, 2013, at 12:50 PM, Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > So this is why it's always an annoyance to try to implement something
> > > > > before Matlab... We've had strsplit since 2009 in Octave, and in 2013,
> > > > > TMW finally implements it themselves, with a differing calling form
> > > > > than ours:
> > > > >
> > > > >   http://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/strsplit.html
> > > > >
> > > > > Anyone feel like chasing after this?
> > > > >
> > > > > - Jordi G. H.
> > > > I've prepared a version that is compatible with Matlab, but compatibility means 
> > > > that the current behavior must be broken.  There are many files which rely upon 
> > > > strsplit().
> > > >
> > > > [...]
> > > >
> > > > I've modified the files to use the new version, and produced a changeset.  I 
> > > > don't see any regressions, but this may break some code on Octave-Forge.
> > > It does. There's a couple of functions in OF that use strsplit. The
> > > problem would be matching a new release of Octave and packages that
> > > make use of it.
> > >
> > > Is anyone interested in contacting Mathworks to propose formation of
> > > some sort of consortium to avoid this sort of things in the future? :p
> > >
> > > Carnë
> > In addition to Mathwork's new strsplit(), they have introduced strjoin().
> >
> >         http://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/strjoin.html
> >
> > Once strjoin() is added the compatible version may be used to obtain the 
> > conventional behavior by ...
> >
> >         cstrsplit = @(str,del, collapsedelimiters=false) strsplit (strjoin 
> > (cellstr (str), del(1)), num2cell (del(:)), collapsedelimiters)
> >
> > The strjoin() function is also a problem for OF.
> >
> >         http://octave.sourceforge.net/strings/function/strjoin.html
> >
> > However, the OF implementation does provide a good starting point for 
> > implementing strjoin() for Octave's core.
> >
> > Ben
> The conflicts between names of m-files isn't going away.  Should a naming 
> convention for OF packages be adopted to reduce the likelihood of a name 
> conflict between Octave core and/or Matlab?
>
> Perhaps the package functions could begin with a prefix?  For example, all control 
> package functions could begin with "ctrl_".  Thus foo.m becomes ctrl_foo.m?
>
> Ben

Isn't the real issue here a lack of namespaces? With the new classdef 
branch I believe the Matlab 'package' structure (adding + to the start 
of directories to sort-of make them into a namespace) is being 
implemented. Perhaps forge packages could start using this? Otherwise it 
will just keep happening. Alternatively, a superior namespace scheme 
could be implemented in Octave (just like that you know, it's easy isn't 
it? ;-) ).

Richard

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