Unnecessary initialization in octave_matrix::double_value ?

[Julien Bect]

Hi all,

I have a (probably naive) C++ question concerning the implementation of 
octave_matrix::double_value ().

It is currently written like this:

double
octave_matrix::double_value (bool) const
{
  double retval = lo_ieee_nan_value ();

  if (is_empty ())
    err_invalid_conversion ("real matrix", "real scalar");

  warn_implicit_conversion ("Octave:array-to-scalar",
                            "real matrix", "real scalar");

  retval = matrix(0, 0);

  return retval;
}

I don't understand the point of initializing retval with the result of 
lo_ieee_nan_value ().  Would it be correct to simply write:

double
octave_matrix::double_value (bool) const
{
  if (is_empty ())
    err_invalid_conversion ("real matrix", "real scalar");

  warn_implicit_conversion ("Octave:array-to-scalar",
                            "real matrix", "real scalar");

  return matrix (0, 0);
}

?

@++
Julien