From bug-request at octave dot org Tue Feb  1 16:06:59 2005
Subject: strange error message
From: "John W. Eaton" <jwe at bevo dot che dot wisc dot edu>
To: Francesco Potorti` <Potorti at isti dot cnr dot it>
Cc: Octave bugs list <bug-octave at bevo dot che dot wisc dot edu>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2005 16:04:07 -0600

On  1-Feb-2005, Francesco Potorti` <Potorti at isti dot cnr dot it> wrote:

| I wrote a bugged function, appended below.  The bug is in the for
| instruction, where I wrote "i" instead of "1".
| 
| The strange thing is that I get this error message, which I suspect
| exposes a bug.
| 
| pot at pot:~/math/workarea$ octave  --no-line-editing
| GNU Octave, version 2.1.64 (i386-pc-linux-gnu).
| Copyright (C) 2004 John W. Eaton.
| This is free software; see the source code for copying conditions.
| There is ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; not even for MERCHANTIBILITY or
| FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  For details, type `warranty'.
| 
| Additional information about Octave is available at http://www.octave.org.
| 
| Please contribute if you find this software useful.
| For more information, visit http://www.octave.org/help-wanted.html
| 
| Report bugs to <bug at octave dot org> (but first, please read
| http://www.octave.org/bugs.html to learn how to write a helpful report).
| 
| octave at pot:1> baco()
| error: invalid XXX FIXME XXX index = 0

Yes, this is a minor bug in the new N-d array indexing code.
The "XXX FIXME XXX" is there as a placeholder until someone decides
what to print there.  I suppose "row" and "column" are still
acceptable for the first and second indices, but what should we print
for the others?  Should we say

  error: invalid third index = 0

here?  If so, we will have to convert from a number to "third".
Things like

  error: invalid index at position 3 (= 0)

would be easier to code, but is it immediately obvious what is meant
by "position 3"?

Suggestions?

Thanks,

jwe



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