Re: What manual says about installing packages

[John Murdie]

(Thanks to Judd Storrs for his useful reply re. searching Octave mailing
lists.)

I made a fresh build of Octave 3.2.3 on Linux, just in case my first
attempt at installing packages had messed something up. Then, having
realised from the output text of 'help pkg' that I probably need to
command 'pkg install -global ...' as user 'bin' to install a package in
an Octave package globally in an installation made by me as 'bin',
immediately tried to install nnet-0.1.10:

> bash-3.1$ octave
> GNU Octave, version 3.2.3
> Copyright (C) 2009 John W. Eaton and others.
> This is free software; see the source code for copying conditions.
> There is ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or
> FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  For details, type `warranty'.
> 
> Octave was configured for "i686-pc-linux-gnu".
> 
> Additional information about Octave is available at http://www.octave.org.
> 
> Please contribute if you find this software useful.
> For more information, visit http://www.octave.org/help-wanted.html
> 
> Report bugs to <address@hidden> (but first, please read
> http://www.octave.org/bugs.html to learn how to write a helpful report).
> 
> For information about changes from previous versions, type `news'.
> 
> octave:1> pkg install -global nnet-0.1.10.tar.gz
> warning: creating installation directory $OCTAVE/share/octave/packages
> warning: load_path: $OCTAVE/share/octave/packages/nnet-0.1.10: No such file 
> or directory
> fwrite: invalid stream number = -1
> error: called from `__makeinfo__' in file 
> $OCTAVE/share/octave/3.2.3/m/help/__makeinfo__.m near line 128, column 5
> error: called from:
> error:   $OCTAVE/share/octave/3.2.3/m/pkg/pkg.m at line 756, column 5
> error:   $OCTAVE/share/octave/3.2.3/m/pkg/pkg.m at line 287, column 7

I found subsequently that I could create a file in the
$OCTAVE/share/octave/packages directory as 'bin'. (I then rm(1)-ed it,
just in case leaving it there would cause a problem.)

Oddly, Octave really seems to have fouled things up, because the next
thing I see and try in the same session is:

> octave:1> help pkg
> warning: load_path: $OCTAVE/share/octave/packages/nnet-0.1.10: No such file 
> or directory
> error: fwrite: invalid stream number = -1
> warning: load_path: $OCTAVE/share/octave/packages/nnet-0.1.10: No such file 
> or directory
> error: called from:
> error:   $OCTAVE/share/octave/3.2.3/m/help/__makeinfo__.m at line 147, column 
> 5
> error:   $OCTAVE/share/octave/3.2.3/m/help/help.m at line 62, column 25

Even starting Octave again and repeating "help pkg" gives the same
result. I have to reinstall Octave before this works as it should.

With the reinstallation and no other changes, the nnet installation
worked ok. Then I tried to install package miscellaneous-1.0.9.tar.gz
(because it is a prerequisite for package statistics-1.0.9, which I
require) and all hell ripped loose:

> octave:1> help pkg
> octave:2> pkg install -global $HOME/Desktop/Downloads/nnet-0.1.10.tar.gz
> warning: creating installation directory $OCTAVE/share/octave/packages
> octave:3> pkg install -global 
> $HOME/Desktop/Downloads/miscellaneous-1.0.9.tar.gz
> error: Permission denied
> terminate called after throwing an instance of 'octave_execution_exception'
> panic: Aborted -- stopping myself...
> attempting to save variables to `octave-core'...
> save to `octave-core' complete
> error: Permission denied
> terminate called after throwing an instance of 'octave_execution_exception'
> panic: Aborted -- stopping myself...
> attempting to save variables to `octave-core'...
> save to `octave-core' complete
> error: Permission denied
> terminate called after throwing an instance of 'octave_execution_exception'
> panic: Aborted -- stopping myself...
> attempting to save variables to `octave-core'...
> save to `octave-core' complete
> octave:4> 

The downloaded package .tar.gz files are readable by 'bin'.

What on earth is going on?

The use of installing globally as 'bin' rather than as the superuser
'root' is to follow the old Unix precept of working as the superuser
only when absolutely necessary. When I install application software, I
always do it as user 'bin', and have been saved from both malicious and
bungled installation scripts in this way (which, had I been 'root',
would have silently corrupted essential parts of my Linux system).

John A. Murdie