Octave packages

[Alakazam]

Hello Robert,

As stated before, this is a macports issue, and I think that help-octave-request at cae.wisc.edu 
  is not best suited to answer these questions :)

> Per my previous e-mail, I uninstalled the octave-time and octave- 
> financial packages with the same results (i.e. missing function). I  
> then executed the "port contents [name of port]" command and found  
> the files for these ports in
>
> /opt/local/share/octave/packages
>
> This location seems to be OK since some of functions (I only checked  
> one) work. However, the busdays.m function from the octave-time  
> package and the fetch.m function from the octave-financial package  
> are not listed in the above directories. So there are missing  
> functions!

I suppose that these functions have been added in the latest versions  
of the packages. Upgrading them should not be too difficult, so you  
can probably have the latest versions in a few days (time for the  
maintainers to update the portfiles). You can also update them  
yourself, and upload the patches to the tracking system, if you are so  
inclined.

> What would happen if I just copy the busdays.m file and the fetch.m  
> file to the above location? Would that work?


That would break a couple of things (mostly the fact that macports is  
aware of all the files in its installation directories). For instance,  
when the port will be upgraded, updating octave-time would bring up an  
error message similar to the one you encountered earlier with  
Aquaterm. It would probably not break the octave installation,  
although I believe that the imported (publicly visible) functions in a  
given octave package are defined in a configuration file which would  
also need to be modified.

Regards,

-- 
Alakazam <alakazam at melix.net>