John W. Eaton wrote
The dldfcn
directory is for functions that require external libraries that we would
prefer to avoid loading unless they are needed. but if a function just
depends on functionality provided by libraries that are always loaded,
there is no particular advantage to making it a .oct file so it might as
well be always linked with Octave.
jwe,
Thanks for clarifying the role of the dld directory.
Doesn't making rarely-used functions .oct files reduce the memory footprint
by the size of that function? That is a benefit for all applications that
don't use that function (i.e., the majority)? What is the overhead of using
a .oct file instead of building the function in (either in time to load or
memory overhead once loaded)?