Function cache too tenacious

[Julius Smith]

Hello,

I'm running Octave version 2.1.36 on a Linux PC, and I encountered a what 
appears to be a bug in function caching behavior. Briefly described, I 
often debug functions by commenting out their declaration line at the top 
and invoking them by name only (after setting up arguments using 
assignments).  This helps because all the function local variables become 
available in the top-level scope where they can be inspected.  The problem 
I found is that Octave seems to be trying to use the function definition 
after I have "overridden it" with a script version of the same name.  Even 
more surprising, "clear functions" does not fix the problem.  However, an 
explicit "clear function-name" does work, so that's a workaround.  All of 
this is illustrated in the diary output below:

octave:2> echo on
octave:3> type testfn
testfn is the user-defined function defined from: /filters/matlab-fp3/testfn.m

function [y] = testfn(x)
y = x
octave:4> x = 1
x = 1
octave:5> y = testfn(x)
y = 1
y = 1
octave:6> % <edit function to comment-out the function line>
octave:6> type testfn
testfn is the user-defined function defined from: /filters/matlab-fp3/testfn.m

%function [y] = testfn(x)
y = x
octave:7> testfn
error: `x' undefined near line 2 column 5
error: evaluating assignment expression near line 2, column 3
error: called from `testfn' in file `/filters/matlab-fp3/testfn.m'
octave:7> x
x = 1
octave:8> clear functions
octave:9> testfn
error: `x' undefined near line 2 column 5
error: evaluating assignment expression near line 2, column 3
error: called from `testfn' in file `/filters/matlab-fp3/testfn.m'
octave:9> x
x = 1
octave:10> clear testfn
octave:11> testfn
+ %function [y] = testfn(x)
+ y = x
y = 1
octave:14> version
ans = 2.1.36
octave:15> diary off



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