Octave version 0.71 is now available

[John Eaton]

Octave version 0.71 is now available for ftp from ftp.che.utexas.edu
in the directory /pub/octave.  Compressed and gzipped tar files are
available.

There have been a lot of changes in the way the files are organized,
so I'm not planning to make diffs this time.

With this release, Octave does not require a specially modified
version of gnuplot, so gnuplot sources are no longer distributed with
Octave.  If you need a copy of gnuplot, its also available from
ftp.che.utexas.edu in the directory /pub/graphics.


Here's a summary of changes for version 0.71:

  * Much improved plotting facility.  With this release, Octave does
    not require a specially modified version of gnuplot, so gnuplot
    sources are no longer distributed with Octave.  For a more
    detailed description of the new plotting features, see the file
    PLOTTING.

  * New plotting commands:

      plot            -- 2D plots
      semilogx        -- 2D semilog plot with logscale on the x axis
      semilogy        -- 2D semilog plot with logscale on the y axis
      loglog          -- 2D log-log plot
      mesh            -- 3D mesh plot
      meshdom         -- create matrices for 3D plotting from two vectors
      contour         -- contour plots of 3D data
      bar             -- create bar graphs
      stairs          -- create stairstep plots
      polar           -- 2D plots from theta-R data
      grid            -- turn plot grid lines on or off
      xlabel, ylabel  -- place labels on the x and y axes of 2D plots
      sombrero        -- demonstrate 3D plotting
      gplot           -- 2D plot command with gnuplot-like syntax
      gsplot          -- 3D plot command with gnuplot-like syntax
      set             -- set plot options with gnuplot syntax
      show            -- show plot options with gnuplot syntax
      closeplot       -- close stream to gnuplot process
      purge_tmp_files -- delete temporary files created by plot command

  * Other new commands:

      ls, dir         -- print a directory listing
      shell_cmd       -- execute shell commands
      keyboard        -- get input from keyboard, useful for debugging
      menu            -- display a menu of options and ask for input
      fft             -- fast fourier transform
      ifft            -- inverse fast fourier transform

  * Strings may be enclosed in either single or double quote
    characters.  Double quote characters are not special within single
    quote strings, and single quotes are not special within double
    quote strings.

  * Command name completion now works for M-file names too.

  * Better help and usage messages for many functions.

  * Help is now available for functions defined in M-files.  The first
    block of comments is taken as the text of the help message.

  * Numerous changes in preparation to support dynamic loading of
    object files with dld.

  * Bug fixes to make solving DAEs with dassl actually work.

  * The command `save file' now saves all variables in the named file.

  * If do_fortran_indexing is 'true', indexing a scalar with
    [1,1,1,...] (n times) replicates its value n times.  The
    orientation of the resulting vector depends on the value of
    prefer_column_vectors.

  * Things like [[1,2][3,4]] no longer cause core dumps, and invalid
    input like [1,2;3,4,[5,6]] now produces a diagnositic message.

  * The cd, save, and load commands now do tilde expansion.

  * It's now possible to clear global variables and functions by name.

  * Use of clear inside functions is now a parse error.


Please send bug reports, suggestions, and other comments to

  address@hidden

Thanks,

--
John W. Eaton      | 4.3BSD is not perfect.  -- Leffler, et al. (1989).
address@hidden |