Re: wikibook: As Octave is used and developped today nearly as a MATLAB clone,

[Steve C. Thompson]

On Thu, 2007-02-01 at 16:30 -0600, Quentin Spencer wrote:
> antonio palestrini wrote:
> > Dear Nicolas,
> > what about to follow the R/S-plus relationship and say
> > something like "As Octave is used and developed today as a
> > GNU MATLAB".
> >
> > Octave is a "Gnu Matlab" .. what do you all think?
> >
>
> Aside from the obvious problems with trademark infringement
> that statement poses, it sounds as strange as saying Linux is a
> "GNU Windows". (Anyone remember Lindows? Microsoft took them to
> court over it.) I think John's statement yesterday (I hope I
> remember correctly since I already deleted the mail) that
> Octave is a free implementation of the Matlab language is the
> most accurate description.

Right, we can just start calling things GNU X if X isn't GNU.  We
can't call The GIMP GNU Photoshop.  Office mates joke around and
tell me they use "non-GNU Gnucash" when referring to Quicken.
Likewise it might be fun to call Matlab "non-GNU Octave" or
Octave a GNU Matlab; but it isn't accurate and may cause trouble.

As has recently been said: GNU Octave is a free program that
implements that Matlab language.

Good discussions!  They are helping we really understand what
Octave is and what it is not.

Steve