Re: Installing a bleeding-edge Octave next to a stable Octave

[Rafael Laboissiere]

* Steve C. Thompson <address@hidden> [2007-03-27 16:41]:

> Now that I've learned about some things about Octave's MEX
> capability from
> http://www.cae.wisc.edu/pipermail/help-octave/2007-March/003473.html
> , I need to think about installing the latest Octave.  As the
> previous post states, 2.9.10.  I'm running 2.1.73 in Ubuntu,
> which is given to me simply with `apt-get install octave' .  I'm
> wondering:
> 
>   1. how best to install 2.9.10 and if I can keep 2.1.73 intact;
>   2. if 1. happens, can I run the two different versions at will,
>      in parallel (for example, I'm currently running simulations
>      in 2.1.73, and I'd like to, at the same time, play around
>      with 2.9.10 for the MEX work); and

I do not know the level of compatibility between Debian and Ubuntu, but you
may try the recently announced Debian packages for 2.9.10.  In Debian, it is
possible to install both the octave2.1-* and the octave2.9-* suites together
and give priority to one or another through the update-alternatives system.

[1] http://www.cae.wisc.edu/pipermail/octave-maintainers/2007-March/002375.html

>   3. what the chances are I'm about to completely mess up my
>      system!

In Debian, the chances are zero.  Hopefully it will be the same in Ubuntu.

-- 
Rafael