Re: Requesting an Octave mentor

[Jordi Gutiérrez Hermos]

I hope it's ok if I respond to several people at once.

2009/8/13 Ben Abbott <address@hidden>:
> I'll be of little help understanding the c++ sources, but regarding
> something to work on, the listeners for the backend would be nice to
> have. In particular having one to convert between the various units
> would be great!
>
> If you're not familiar with what I'm referring to, I can explain.

Alright, this sounds interesting. I really want Octave's plotting to
shine. This is likely to attract more people to the project. Yes,
please, I'd like more explanations. I'll contact you privately
momentarily to see if you have an IM account I can use for chatting
about this.

Or if IRC is convenient, maybe #octave in Freenode?

2009/8/13 Robert T. Short <address@hidden>:
> In my case it is a case of the blind leading the blind, but I would be happy
> to give this a try myself. Nothing teaches like teaching!

I agree. Perhaps you'd be more comfortable thinking of yourself as my
study buddy?

> Also, if there is anything I can do to help if you like the stuff Ben is
> looking at, that would be fine.

Let's do that. Let's work together with Ben.

2009/8/14 John W. Eaton <address@hidden>:
> On 14-Aug-2009, Jaroslav Hajek wrote:
>
> | That's easy - the whole lot of Octave sources is a horrible mess of
> | ill-designed classes, random hacks, gotchas and incomprehensible
> | blocks of unreadable code that you just hope are never actually
> | executed.
>
> Thanks.

I consider it a well-established theorem of software development that
everyone's code sucks. Jaroslav's, mine, yours, everyone's. ;-) Proof:
either you stick to a rigid design methodology or you adapt loose and
flexible coding standard. In the former case, you will eventually come
upon a situation where your original design isn't flexible enough, in
which case it sucks, and in the latter situation your design is a
horrible mess of ad-hoc hacks, which also sucks. QED.

No, but seriously, Octave's code is messy because it's trying to solve
many complicated problems, but despite that, to quote the bard, I know
that there is method in the madness, because I've seen you guys talk
about it, and because I've glimpsed it myself. I have also worked with
very messy source trees, but with a little dedication, I've seen the
patterns emerging.

All I'm asking for is a little help in seeing those patterns in Octave
sources. :-)

Hopefully Ben and Robert above can help me get started.

- Jordi G. H.