Re: Getting started with Octave in MS Windows

[Michael Grossbach]

The Grumps wrote:
> Actually that's the way I was thinking of working until you told me about
> 'edit filename'.  So when do you choose to invoke edit from within Octave?
> I can see some advantage when creating new scripts but not much otherwise.
When I started using Octave I always used the 'edit filename' way to 
work on a function file. Then I became annoyed by not being able to go 
back to the Octave prompt while the file was open, so now I mostly open 
files by double clicking on them, once they exist (or use the recent 
document facility under the Windows Start button. I guess it's just your 
personal preference which way you choose.

> I have found it useful to enable the "recent files" list in SciTE.  To do
> this I added 
>  	 -save.recent ".m" 

%<----------------------------------- snip -----------------------

Interesting, I will be looking into this... Thanks for pointing it out!

> I'd also like to raise another matter here if that's ok - GNUPLOT under
> Windows.  When I plot I get a GNUPLOT window as well.  What is the use of
> this?  Is it to help debug the plot?  If I close this down when I've
> finished with a plot then I find that a further plot command is ignored and
> I have to re-open Octave in order to resume plotting.  Is this what is
> supposed to happen?  If so, should I just leave the GNUPLOT window open?
It is supposed to pop up, but you can ignore it - minimise it if you 
like. This is the command line window of gnuplot where you type your 
gnuplot-specific commands (gnuplot is totally independent of Octave, it 
is a very powerful program on its own). Octave translates your plot 
commands into the gnuplot language and pipes them through.
If you would like to clear the plot window before plotting anew, use the
'clr' command (clear). It took me a while to figure this, thought I 
share this.

HTH, Michael

P.S.: The to: you always bounces back with the complaint that your 
account does not exist. Thought you might want to know.