Re: Octave in Universities

[Robert S. Weigel]

I have been working on web interfaces lately.  I am in the process of 
integrating the UKY code with something to interactively view space plasma 
time series.  Here is an excellent interactive SVG plotter that I am 
modifying to receive the plot commands: 
http://www.codedread.com/displayWebStats.php.

I don't have anything general or ready for demo right now, but I just wanted 
to let you know of someone who is interested in web interfaces.

Bob


> >   Afaik, few of my present or past colleagues use Octave - except
> > perhaps Mai Zhou [1] at the math dept. of the U. of Kentucky, who
> > maintains a web interface [2]. I will ask for his comments.
>
> Thinking about web interfaces to octave, I got concerned about
> the security implications.  For example, the system call gives
> full access to the local shell, and there are commands like
> fopen which can also be dangerous in the right hands.
>
> I wrote a quick little function clear_builtin which removes
> a function symbol from the current context, from the prompt
> and from the builtin function list.  That means you don't have
> to hack your version of octave to remove system().
>
> A complete solution would clear a number of builtin functions
> and provide oct-file replacements for alternatives which do
> complete argument checking (e.g., fopen which strips all directory
> information before opening).
>
> Anyone want to put something together and add it to octave-forge?
>
> - Paul
>
> -- clear_builtin.cc --
> #include <octave/oct.h>
> #include <octave/symtab.h>
>
> DEFUN_DLD(clear_builtin,args,nargout,"clear a builtin function")
> {
>    octave_value_list retval;
>    if (args.length() != 1) {
>      print_usage("clearfn");
>    } else {
>      std::string nm(args(0).string_value());
>      if (!error_state) {
>        fbi_sym_tab->clear(nm);
>        curr_sym_tab->clear(nm);
>        top_level_sym_tab->clear(nm);
>      }
>    }
>    return retval;
> }
>
>
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> 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
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-- 
Bob Weigel
Assistant Professor
School of Computational Sciences and 
Department of Physics
George Mason University
4400 University Drive, MS 5C3
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444
Office: Science & Tech I, Room 111
Phone: (703) 993-1361 (office)
Phone: (720) 989-7857 (cell)
Fax: (703) 993-1993
Email: address@hidden
Web: http://www.scs.gmu.edu/~rweigel



-------------------------------------------------------------
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
-------------------------------------------------------------