From help-request at octave dot org Mon Jun 27 04:47:24 2005 Subject: Re: origin of the index syntax From: David Bateman To: Francesco Potorti` Cc: Octave users list , Matevz Pustisek , Dragan Savic Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2005 11:43:11 +0200 Francesco Potorti` wrote: >Dear Octave users, > >does anyone know where the index expression syntax used in Octave comes >from? Is the Matlab people who invented it? Or else it is older? Was >it just the evolution of something in common usage? > > I believe the syntax was developed at the time when octave-forge was being setup, and its category index was also being setup. Probably Paul Kienzle had a hand in the development, however the original author of the make_index script, that makes use of the INDEX files to create the category index, is Albert Danial. So if there is someone to praise (blame :-) ) for the INDEX file syntax it is probably him. >I would like to know because, in a program we are planning to write, we >will very likely use the same index expression syntax as Octave's, and >we would like to find a proper name to describe it. > > > As for a proper name for the scheme why not "octave indexing files". D. -- David Bateman David dot Bateman at motorola dot com Motorola Labs - Paris +33 1 69 35 48 04 (Ph) Parc Les Algorithmes, Commune de St Aubin +33 1 69 35 77 01 (Fax) 91193 Gif-Sur-Yvette FRANCE The information contained in this communication has been classified as: [x] General Business Information [ ] Motorola Internal Use Only [ ] Motorola Confidential Proprietary ------------------------------------------------------------- Octave is freely available under the terms of the GNU GPL. Octave's home on the web: http://www.octave.org How to fund new projects: http://www.octave.org/funding.html Subscription information: http://www.octave.org/archive.html -------------------------------------------------------------