Re: Octave Help Mode?

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 10:42:41 +0200 Christian Herenz wrote:

> David Hansen schrieb:

>> It's working here but I use a developer version of emacs.  Is C-h S
>> working?
>
> I am not at my computer at the moment, so I cannot test this. However,
> I noted yesterday, when browsing the GNU Octave Info File lots of
> Nodes which are shown in the index are actually not present. Is this
> right, or does openSUSE ship a wrong info file. Sorry, this tends to
> be more an octave question, but since I am using it inside Emacs, I
> ask here.

This seems to be suses fault.  With Debians GNU Octave, version 3.0.0
the manual looks pretty complete here.

>>
>> To the emacs-devels:
>>
>> Is there any need for `ocatave-help' if `info-lookup-symbol' is doing
>> the same (as far as I can see)?
>
> Mh, maybe octave-help, if working properly should just search the
> octave manual,

That's exactly what info-lookup-symbol does.  It takes the info manual
that fits best to the current major mode.  E.g. in c-mode it would just
use the libc manual.

> so if there is an ambivalence between a octave 'symbol'
> and something which is actually not octave, wrong results could be
> retrived.

In this case "symbol" just means "something in the index" and defaults
to the (syntactically) symbol at the current cursor position.

>> Maybe adjust INFO_PATH but that sounds like a Debilian bug.
>>
>
> Do you mean the shell-variable INFO_PATH, which I would export in my
> .profile (or simialar), or do you mean something emacs-specific?

The shell variable

> As stated above, just entering "info octave" in a normal terminal
> works fine.

Hmm, you can try to set `Info-additional-directory-list' then, but this
actually looks more like an Emacs bug to me.

> The thing is, I really want to work with octave, and I just think it
> is good to look something up directly inside the environment I am
> doing my octave stuff (i.e. emacs), however since I am fan of printed
> works I ordered via my libary today the "GNU Octave Manual" by
> J.W. Eaton (Network Theory Ltd.). Since it is not present in my
> home-libary I have to wait a little bit (cause its inter-libary loan),
> but I will fill out some forms today, that more "official" printed GNU
> Documentation will be available in our libary soon. At present, there
> is actually none :(

You can also produce pdf or ps from the texinfo sources if that is good
enough for you.

David