[Fwd: Calling Octave from C++]

[Xavier Amatriain]

Hi all,

We are developing a C++ framework for Music and Audio Processing
(www.iua.upf.es/mtg/clam).

Our users have continuously requested to add a feature of being able to
call external Matlab functions from within the framework. We have been
reluctant to do so. One of the main reasons is that ours is a Free
Software environment and we do not feel like offering support for a
non-Free tool. That is why I was thinking on offering support for Octave
instead and promote the use of this great tool instead of Matlab.

But by reading this mailing list archive I see that calling Octave from
C++ is not very feasible. If I understand right there is no problem in
calling standard functions already implemented in liboctave but it is
not that easy with new .m files provided by the user.

I read in a mail by John Eaton the following:

" (...) if you are writing a dynamically linked function for
Octave, you could also use feval to call Octave's .m file version of
the function, but if you are writing a standalone program, that won't
work (without also loading all of Octave's interpreter, which I would
bet is more than you really want).  And in either case, if you use the
interpreted function, it will probably be a lot slower than you want (...)"

Before continuing our attempt on integrating Octave I would like to have
a clarification on the previous comment. I understand that for
standalone applications calling Octave functions it is necessary to load
the whole Octave interpreter. I think that is the way things work also
in Matlab. I understand that this makes things go much slower. But is
that the only problem? Provided that in these cases we are only talking
about rapid prototyping and efficiency is not a must, will this decrease
in speed be reasonable? Does anyone know if it can be comparable to the
speed in doing the same operation with Matlab?

Thanks

-- 
/**********************************
********* Xavier Amatriain ********
****** Music Technology Group *****
** IUA- Universitat Pompeu Fabra **
****** www.iua.upf.es/~xamat ******
***********************************/



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