RE: Windows?

[Schirmacher, Rolf]

I must confess that I did not follow all details of the thread. I am bound
to a windows environment and would like to use octave within a restricted
commercial environment.

By now, I only used the MSVC-precompiled builds and I really appreciate
them. The key is that they are really easy to install and use (even without
administrative privelleges) and are well maintained - thanks Micheal!

Now I probably have to switch to mingw in the future. O.k. - but what does
that mean from a user perspective?

One thing I understand immediately is that I would need gcc in mingw to
build oct-files (instead of MSVC). But I would assume that most windows
users rarely build oct-files themselves (at least those users who we are
worrying about here). And please remember all the issues with getting the
right "MSVC release" - that really never was easy. In addition, mingw/gcc
might be distributed in the same package, ensuring that every user is able
to build oct-files without additional package loading (that would even be an
improvement over MSVC).

What else will change?

Will there be a reduced performance of octave? 

Will gnuplot still work well with a good performance for the rendering?

Will there be limited interaction with standard software? (I use emacs as a
shell / UI anyway).

Will I have to install separate packages (e.g. the mingw environment) or
will all be bundled in one package (as the MSVC build)?

Are there additional caveats when switching?

I really never used a mingw build on windows, so I honestly ask the experts
to comment on these questions. 
But if the changes from a user perspective will be minimum or virtually
non-existant, then many users might not even notice the difference of mingw
instead of MSVC and all the discussion is not really worth continuing.

Just my 2 ct.

Rolf