Re: Geometry Chapter of the manual

[David Bateman]

Quentin Spencer wrote:

> The addition of the sparse matrix dependencies seemed to cause a fair
> amount of confusion on the help list. I have no problem with adding more
> dependencies, but maybe we need to make it clearer to people who want to
> compile octave themselves that they are optional. I don't know how to do
> that--any ideas? Maybe there should be a document somewhere telling
> people how to install the development packages for common
> distributions--that one seems to trip people up a lot.
> 

Quentin,

Yes adding a dependency means that Octave becomes progressively harder
to build. However, it also means the addition of new functionality with
the minimum work on the part of the Octave developers. There is a
compromise to achieve hear and I think its normal that the addition of
each new dependency to the core of Octave should be considered on a case
by case basis with some discussion of interested parties.

So in particular, in your opinion, does the inclusion of the convhull,
convhulln, delaunay, delaunay3, delaunayn, griddata, tsearch, voronoi
and voronoin function justify the inclusion of the dependency on QHull?
Are these functions of sufficiently large value to accept the cost of a
harder build of Octave?

Regards
David