Sorry for trolling

[Chuck Dorval]

>> So I am guessing at least 20 main contributors in the last year and at
>> ...
>> I guess Matlab's main team is about 10 active + 10 backup developers/

> Pretty much right for Octave though perhaps high, I'd say 10 to 15
> rather than 20. For mathworks however ...
>
> they employ 2000 people, and I'd guess 10% of those at least are
> developers given that mathworks is a software company. So you expect 10
> to 15 un-paid part time developers to do the same job for 200 paid full
> time developers?

The thing is, the 10 to 15 highly adept part timers who do develop
Octave in their free time, do such a ridiculously fantastic job that
they are heralded as a near-equal development force, the main
competition even, with Mathwork's 100s to 1000s of full time paid
developers.  If that's not proof that Octave is in good hands, I don't
know what is.

I've been using Matlab for over 15 years, and Octave for close to 10.
I still use both extensively, depending on the situation and who I'm
working with, but all of my serious number crunching is done
exclusively in Octave.  Yes, not everything translates perfectly.
There was a period a few years ago where I was trying to port a Matlab
package, written by other people and dependent upon the mex compiler
system, to Octave.  Something not done very often, and the package
developers had used many rare mex/C commands, so naturally there were
bugs in the porting to Octave.  But after reporting them, each one was
fixed in a matter of hours.  The developers of Octave, in their free
time, cared enough about their 'product' to help me with dozens of my
personal problems!  I've found many bugs in Matlab over the years, and
I've always had to work around them.

The developers of Octave are saints who spend undo effort to keep
Octave compatible with Matlab in spite of the occasional poor
operational decisions made at The Mathworks.  They do this *not* to
steal _customers_, but to enable _users_ like you and me to
collaborate with people who insist on sticking with Matlab. If you
believe Matlab delivers a product worthy of the student-starter-kit
they inject into your arm for free (or $100), by all means use Matlab,
and leave the Octave developers alone.  But keep in mind that you
won't be a student forever, and Mathworks doesn't make its money off
the student licenses.  Most importantly, no one is forcing, or even
encouraging you to use Octave.  If you don't like it, go away. We're
all very sorry you failed to purchase Matlab from your Amazon.com
basket two months ago.

I'm sorry to be mean.  But you really need to understand how amazing
the Octave developers are.  They're not out to get you.  So you had a
problem and regret that you didn't buy Matlab -- I get that. But don't
take it out on volunteers!  It's like berating doctors who are
donating their time in ghetto neighborhood clinics, for not having all
the amenities of the Beverly Hills plastic surgery spas.  I don't
think you intended to be as mean as you were, eh :).

Peace-
Chuck