Re: Octave 3.8.0 on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS

[Julien Bect]

On 05/02/2014 06:01, mpender wrote:
> Is there any plan to release Octave 3.8.0 for Ubuntu 12.04 
> (long-term-support version) any time soon? I don't want to just assume 
> that it will be released eventually, since the intermediate versions 
> have not been released for Ubuntu 12.04.

Hello Mike,

If I understand correctly (everyone else : please correct me if I'm 
wrong), the octave package that you see in the Ubuntu package repository 
comes directly from the Debian package repository.

For instance, with Ubuntu 12.04 (LTS) you get octave 3.2.4, probably 
because 12.04LTS has been based on Debian "squeeze", which was the 
testing Debian release at that time (?).

If you upgrade to the latest Ubuntu release (13.10), you will get octave 
3.6.4, which is the version currently available in Debian "jessie" (the 
current testing release for Debian).

So, the first question you should ask yourself is : when will Octave 
3.8.0 be available in the Debian repositories ? As you can see here :

http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=octave

it is currently available in the experimental distribution. I'm not 
familiar enough with the Debian packaging process to tell you when you 
can expect to see Octave 3.8.0 in Debian unstable or testing, you should 
perhaps contact the Debian Octave group 
(https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/DebianOctaveGroup) for this kind of question.

Now, concerning your original question : I don't think that Ubuntu 12.04 
LTS will ever include Octave 3.8.0, since the point of an "LTS" release 
is to be achieve stability over time. Ubuntu 12.04LTS seems to be frozen 
on the package releases from Debian "squeeze", i.e., Octave branch 3.2.x 
(otherwise, it would already include Octave 3.6.2, which is now in 
Debian "wheezy" (testing).

Hope that helps (and sorry for the rather verbose answer...),

Julien.