Re: The future of my involvement with the Octave project

[Nicolas Pettiaux]

2008/10/7 John W. Eaton <address@hidden>:

I first want to thank you for the great job you have done with octave so far.

I wonder, as octave as recently been set by the FSF (Free software
foundation) as a priority project (see
http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority.html; 8th place) if this could
not help to get some funding for your work, either from the FSF or
with the help of the FSF.

What I see from my use in the University where I teach numerical
analysis courses exercices, in an environnement where I have succeeded
to have octave accepted as a replacement for matlab, the "official"
language for numerical analysis that the student must master, is that
few point are still missing for the students, who can choose to use
octave:

1/ the GUI of current matlab attract them; I have said that this is
often a way to loose oneself in the numerous windows, but still many
appreciate,

2/ the better matlab help function that uses more intuitive html
linked pages that are better searchable. I think that to change octave
help in a better indexed help system could be done, even if I do not
have the capabilities to do it, with some javascript help system. I
have read that gimp 2.6 help has just been reworked to use webkit and
that this is a "progress".

3/ easier plotting management, but this has been much worked on (my
only problem is that I do not see how to switch easily form the old
octave backend to the newer java one)

Thanks,

Nicolas

-- 
Nicolas Pettiaux
April - « promouvoir et défendre le logiciel libre » - www.april.org

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