[Plplot-devel] Octave high-end interface/unicode troubles

[Alan W. I. <ir...@be...>]

I get the following results for the installed examples
and for CVS HEAD.

./plplot-test.sh --device=png --front-end=octave 2>&1
Testing front-end octave

*** PLPLOT WARNING ***
Too many colours in cmap0.

*** PLPLOT ERROR ***
plcol0: Invalid color map entry: 165, aborting operation

.... + many more messages filling the screen several times over.  Note these
error/warning messages are for the exotic octave "p" examples that use the
high-level octave interface. The "x" examples that only use the low-order
octave interface seem to work fine.

Every other front end works fine with --device=png.

Also, if I locally edit plplot-test.sh so that the png options are
-drvopt text=0,smooth=0, (which gives us Hershey fonts in that case),
the octave problem goes away.

So clearly there seems to be some problem/incompatibility between
gd.c/plfreetype.c/unicode and the _high-level_ octave interface.  This is the
first time (I believe) that combination has been tested.

Currently I am running octave version 2.1.64-1 and if debian unstable users
update their systems they will be running 2.1.67-1. I don't think that
octave version difference will matter for this incompatibility, but you
never know until you try.

Rafael, do you confirm this problem?

Tom, if Rafael (as our resident octave expert) cannot fix this in short
order, then we can probably do some workaround so the combination of the
octave high-level interface and unicode fonts for the png, jpeg, or giff
devices is not allowed by tests implemented in our high-level octave
interface.  That way, we avoid turning off unicode fonts for all our other
front ends where there is no fundamental problem using the gd devices with
unicode.  But ideally, of course, Rafael will be able to find a solution.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin
email: ir...@be...
phone: 250-727-2902

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state implementation
for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting software
package (plplot.org); the Yorick front-end to PLplot (yplot.sf.net); the
Loads of Linux Links project (loll.sf.net); and the Linux Brochure Project
(lbproject.sf.net).
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