dispatch

[John W. Eaton]

I would like to merge the sparse-merge CVS branch with the main trunk
soon.  The main thing holding up the merge is that the sparse code
relies on the dispatch function from octave-forge, and I would prefer
that the core Octave distribution not require functions from
octave-forge.

I like that the current implementation of dispatch only imposes the
overhead of dispatching for functions that have been marked.  But when
we implement Matlab-compatible classes, we will have to look for class
methods for every function call (there can be a cache to speed
lookups, but since people can add functions to @CLASS directories at
runtime, I think we will still have to look in the filesystem to see
if any new functions are available for a given class).

Should we copy the dispatch function to Octave (as a short term
solution that would allow the sparse code to be merged quickly) or
take the time now to do more invasive surgery and add dispatch
directly to the function lookup code in the core of Octave?

Comments?

Thanks,

jwe