Re: Installing Octave using FinkCommander

[Henry F. Mollet]

I would have preferred a binary installation also. When I installed Octave
2.1.36 one year ago there was no binary installation available for OS 10.2.

Apparently that has changed but I overlooked it when trying to install to
most-recent available version on Fink, which is Octave 2.1.46-1 and indeed
available as a binary:
flagged    status    name    installed    version    binary    category
summary    
NO    current    octave    2.1.46-1    2.1.46-1    2.1.46-1    sci
Matlab-like language for computations

What is darwinport?

During the first unsuccessful installation most time (4 hr) was spend on
compiling g77 (Fortran compiler). During the second installation most of the
time (3 hr) was spent on compiling/building/activating xfree86 which I
didn't need. Gnuplot installation then took about 10 min and Octave
installation 1.5 hr.
Thanks, Henry


on 12/3/03 3:03 PM, Gavin Jin at address@hidden wrote:

> 
> I guess Fink's distribution of octave might have more dependence on
> other
> packages than needed.  I don't remember how long it took to
> build 2.1.50 from scratch with darwinPort, but I don't think it took
> more than an hour.
> 
> The same goes with direct build with the latest source.
> 
> I prefer binary installation with fink, as most packages don't take
> more than 30 seconds to install
> once they are downloaded.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Dec 2, 2003, at 7:59 PM, Henry F. Mollet wrote:
> 
>> Thanks. I'm back in business but do not really understand what's going
>> on.
>> The second time around I was more careful and picked option (2) below.
>> Instead of 31 packages, as during first unsuccessful installation with
>> option (1), only 10 additional packages were installed.
>> 
>> Second installation run to completion in about 6 hrs but I was not
>> sure what
>> would happen with regard to graphics. When I run a script which does
>> some
>> matrix calculations and then uses:
>> % Trying a graph
>> gset term aqua (1)
>> It worked exactly as before and AquaTerm was called (I guess by
>> gnuplot) and
>> it graphed what I expected as before. I know that AquaTerm (but not
>> octave
>> nor gnuplot) was installed during unsuccessful first installation on
>> 11/28/03.
>> 
>> So my question remains: Why should a later Fink package of octave (i.e.
>> GNU Octave, version 2.1.46 (powerpc-apple-darwin6.8)
>> out of the blue need xfree86 when my earlier package 2.1.36 did not
>> require
>> it. At that time (one year ago), I had downloaded xfree86 but was told
>> that
>> I did not need it.
>> 
>> Dec 02 2003 Reinstall
>> Information about 1324 packages read in 11 seconds.
>> fink needs help picking an alternative to satisfy a virtual
>> dependency. The
>> candidates:
>> (1)     system-xfree86: Placeholder package for manually installed
>> XFree86
>> (2)     xfree86-base: XFree86 libraries, utilities, clients and data
>> 
>> Pick one: [1]
>> The following package will be reinstalled:
>>  octave
>> The following 10 additional packages will be installed:
>>  fftw fftw-shlibs gnuplot hdf hdf5 hdf5-bin hdf5-shlibs texinfo
>> xfree86-base
>>  xfree86-base-shlibs
>> Do you want to continue? [Y/n]
>> curl -f -L -O http://distfiles.opendarwin.org/X4211src.tar.bz2
>> ....cut....
>> Henry
>> 
>> on 12/2/03 12:27 PM, Gavin Jin at address@hidden wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> According to Fink, system-xfree86-4.2-13 is just a place holder for
>>> other X11 like Apple's.
>>> So, if you installed system-xfree86,  you have to have some other
>>> distribution of X11.
>>> 
>>> Maybe you need to install or reinstall Apple's X11, along with the X11
>>> SDK, and the latest development tools
>>> for 10.2 from Apple.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Dec 1, 2003, at 7:49 PM, Henry F. Mollet wrote:
>>> 
>>>> Thank you and apologies for incomplete info. I'm still using Mac OSX
>>>> V.10.2.8 (not 10.3 Panther) and was under the impression that
>>>> Fink/FinkCommander would lead me to latest source code.
>>>> 
>>>> Whereas I noticed that an info and a patch file for 2.1.50-11 were
>>>> downloaded during the failed installation, it was only
>>>> octave-2.1.46.tar.gz
>>>> that was downloaded but then apparently not installed because of
>>>> alleged
>>>> problem with package system-xfree86-4.2-13. (I don't need xfree86
>>>> because my
>>>> previous version of Octave, 2.1.35, installed 1 yr ago using Fink,
>>>> worked
>>>> fine using Gnuplot in combination with AquaTerm).
>>>> 
>>>> I had a look at http://homepage.mac.com/chibaf/math/macosx/install/
>>>> which looks promising and I'll work on it as soon as the link to
>>>> Octave
>>>> loads in my browser. However, this URL appears to have conflicting
>>>> information. It first mentions what's needed (OS 10.2 or later,
>>>> Developer,
>>>> AND FINK). Then it says to install g77, which I suspect is not needed
>>>> if
>>>> FINK was installed?) and then it gives
>>>> % .configure
>>>> % make
>>>> % sudo make install
>>>> instructions for some of the programs (e.g. Gnuplot and Octave with
>>>> Atlas
>>>> and fftw) implying that we are not using Fink.
>>>> 
>>>> Similar to the current thread on installation of Octave on PC, the
>>>> instructions apparently are never quite clear for many on Mac or PC
>>>> to
>>>> get
>>>> Octave running, so one could use this great program without major
>>>> difficulties to begin with.
>>>> Henry
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> on 12/1/03 4:51 PM, Gavin Jin at address@hidden wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> The Fink developers were still porting applications to 10.3 last
>>>>> time
>>>>> I
>>>>> checked, and
>>>>> they still recommended binary installation until they stabilize the
>>>>> packages.
>>>>> 
>>>>> That supported binary  is older than 2.1.46.
>>>>> 
>>>>> So I  updated  mine with Darwinport
>>>>> 
>>>>> [gavin-unix:myWork/ruby/libpcap-ruby] gjin% octave --version
>>>>> GNU Octave, version 2.1.50 (powerpc-apple-darwin7.0.0).
>>>>> Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 John W.
>>>>> Eaton.
>>>>> This is free software; see the source code for copying conditions.
>>>>> There is ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; not even for MERCHANTIBILITY or
>>>>> FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Report bugs to <address@hidden>.
>>>>> [gavin-unix:myWork/ruby/libpcap-ruby] gjin% port search octave
>>>>> octave          math/octave     2.1.50          a Matlab-like
>>>>> environment for numerical analysis
>>>>> [gavin-unix:myWork/ruby/libpcap-ruby] gjin%
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> I also downloaded the latest source code and followed the
>>>>> instructions
>>>>> on http://homepage.mac.com/chibaf/math/macosx/install/
>>>>> without any problem.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Dec 1, 2003, at 2:18 PM, Henry F. Mollet wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>>> I know this is a Fink or FinkCommander problem but I'm hoping a Mac
>>>>>> user on
>>>>>> this list will be able to help.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I've tried to upgrade Octave to the latest available version on
>>>>>> Fink
>>>>>> and
>>>>>> failed and deleted previous version of Octave by mistake.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I've tried to install octave 2.1.46-1 using FinkCommander and
>>>>>> after 6.5 hours of compilation, the installation failed:
>>>>>> ### execution of dpkg failed, exit code 1
>>>>>> Failed: can't install package system-xfree86-4.2-13
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I did not anticipate xfree86 was needed and I may have made a
>>>>>> mistake
>>>>>> with
>>>>>> regard to any options presented for this during installation.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> A little checking showed that
>>>>>> SW/Applications/AquaTerm (application) was present/installed and
>>>>>> could
>>>>>> be
>>>>>> opened. The tar.gz files for both octave and gnuplot were present
>>>>>> in
>>>>>> SW/SRC
>>>>>> but neither application was installed.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Before trying re-installation, I'm hoping for tip. Thanks
>>>>>> Henry
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>> Octave is freely available under the terms of the GNU GPL.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Octave's home on the web:  http://www.octave.org
>>>>>> How to fund new projects:  http://www.octave.org/funding.html
>>>>>> Subscription information:  http://www.octave.org/archive.html
>>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>> Gavin Jin
>>>>> 150 Castilian Dr, Santa Barbarba
>>>>> CA 93110
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 805-961-3693
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>> Gavin Jin
>>> 150 Castilian Dr, Santa Barbarba
>>> CA 93110
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 805-961-3693
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -------------------------------------------------------------
>> Octave is freely available under the terms of the GNU GPL.
>> 
>> Octave's home on the web:  http://www.octave.org
>> How to fund new projects:  http://www.octave.org/funding.html
>> Subscription information:  http://www.octave.org/archive.html
>> -------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> 
> Gavin Jin
> 150 Castilian Dr, Santa Barbarba
> CA 93110
> 
> 
> 805-961-3693



-------------------------------------------------------------
Octave is freely available under the terms of the GNU GPL.

Octave's home on the web:  http://www.octave.org
How to fund new projects:  http://www.octave.org/funding.html
Subscription information:  http://www.octave.org/archive.html
-------------------------------------------------------------