Problems Installing/Running Octave on Mac OS X 10.6.8

[Paul Sims]

Hi all,

I'm having some trouble getting Octave to run on my mac, version 10.6.8. I followed the octave wiki instructions here:

http://www.octave.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installing_MacOS_X_Bundle

and got all the files (Octave, GnuPlot, and Aquaterm) into my applications folder. I then opened Octave, got the start up message with copyright, and entered the first line of code per the instructions from the wiki section: Running Octave and Gnuplot from a Terminal

sudo touch /usr/local/bin/gnuplot

However, I got a message asking for confirmation since this could change my settings, which I said yes to and now I can't use Octave. All I got was a request for a password which I didn't know. When I click on Octave now I get my terminal screen, but with no recognition of Octave, no set up screen, etc. I tried uninstalling and reinstalling octave to no avail. 

Any ideas on what I did wrong and what I can do to fix it would be GREATLY appreciated. 

Thanks in advance!

- Paul