RE: issue with user preferences (was "problem with column specification in matrices")

[John W. Eaton]

On  1-Nov-2002, Julian DeMarchi <address@hidden> wrote:

| However, I also realise Octave has several very useful improvements
| over Matlab (even at the most mundane levels -- for instance, take
| the ++ operator).  There should be no reason to cut out these
| wonderful features, as optional features.

I have no problem with optional features that don't overlap (at least
not until Matlab introduces something that does cause a conflict).

| Whether or not Octave enhancements run in Matlab could be the
| kind of "competition", if you will, to push the Mathworks to update
| their syntax and feature set down the road.

FWIW, if you look at the latest release notes for Matlab, you will
find

  && and || for short-circuit logical ops
  true and false functions
  try-catch statements no longer catch Control-C interrupts
  C-style format specs in error and warning functions

all of which have been in Octave for some time (though at least one
person wanted Octave to emulate Matlab's previous try-catch behavior
for Control-C interrupts).  Other things that I think were in Octave
first (and may still be missing from Matlab) include

  structures
  C-style I/O
  varargs
  saved command history
  command and filename completion
  static variables
  DAE solver
  Unix system calls
  double quotes for strings[1]

(and I'm sure that there are others that I'm forgetting) though when
the MathWorks introduced some of these in Matlab, they chose to be
incompatible with Octave.

jwe


[1] I still fail to understand why Matlab issues an error for this and
    tells you to use single quotes instead of just accepting double
    quotes too!



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