Re: [OctDev] listing functions in a package

[David Bateman]

c. wrote:
> On 18/feb/08, at 13:33, David Bateman wrote:
>
>   
>> c. wrote:
>>     
>>> Does the attached patch do what you intended?
>>>       
>> It fails on the signal package that includes variables in the INDEX  
>> file
>> like
>>
>> <quote>
>> $SPCTOOLS= in spline directory of Dennis Brown's <a
>> href="ftp://svr-ftp.eng.cam.ac.uk/pub/comp.speech/tools/ 
>> spctools">SPCtools</a>
>> $TFTB= try <a
>> href="http://www-isis.enst.fr/Applications/tftb/iutsn.univ- 
>> nantes.fr/auger/tftb.html">Time-Frequency
>> Tool box</a>
>>
>>
>> signal >> Signal processing
>> Signals
>>  diric
>>  gauspuls
>>  ...
>> </quote>
>>
>> The function categories are incorrectly probed.. You should scan for
>> "signal >>" and ignore anything beforehand.. Apart from that it  
>> looks good..
>>
>> D.
>>     
>
> David,
>
> Looking at the INDEX for the signal package I also see lines like:
>
> arcov= use <code>ar_covar</code> $SPCTOOLS
>
> I was not aware that such things were possible...
> I see this syntax is explained in the comments to main/INDEX while it  
> is not
> on the octave-forge website (wouldn't it be worth adding at least a  
> reference
> to this syntax specification on http://octave.sourceforge.net/ 
> developers.html ?).
>
> To handle such lines with variable substitution and markup tags will  
> require a bit more
> logic than expected, I'll look into it.
> Would a patch that implements just skipping those lines be acceptable  
> for the meantime?
> After all this syntax is expected to be used for functions that are  
> not implemented in the
> package, anyway...
>
> c.
>
> P.S. I see the inline octave documentation (doc pkg) also has a section
> describing the syntax of the INDEX file but does not mention variable
> substitution or markup language.
>   
These variables are typical to give the user a reference to an
alternative means of achieving something in Octave that you can achieve
in Matlab. Therefore its probably better not to use the INDEX files at
all and use the method you previously used of scanning the *.m *.oct and
*.mex files.. Though you'll also need to take care of the dispatch
commands that might be in the PKG_ADD files.

D.

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