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Re: Plea for IDL 2000 (was: a plea for more reliable mathematical routines)
> In article <onyae3c0ui.fsf@cow.physics.wisc.edu>,
> craigmnet@cow.physics.wisc.edu wrote:
>
>> have spent a profound amount of my time working around IDL bugs.
>>
>> Love/Hate, that's what it is!
>
>
at least the quirks keep your attention focused on IDL ;-)
(not on your scientific problem though ;-() But to be constructive:
how about a user-bug-fix initiative? A great many of IDL's routine
are written in the IDL language, so everyone can go ahead and check them
through (at least it's partly open source that way -- although RSI
imposes a pretty stringent copyright notice on their routines). If
RSI would be willing to cooperate here and perhaps set up a web site,
ftp archive etc. where people could download the most recent versions
of the IDL procedures, and upload their corrected versions (or submit
them with some guarantee that they would appear in the archive with
a reasonable response time) that could give them a bunch of programmers for
free so to speak. To name an example: just last week I eliminated an
annoying restriction in VELOVECT.PRO which is that it does not accept
2D arrays for X and Y and hence does not work for irregulariliy gridded
data. Well, now it does;-) and I would be happy to contribute this fix.
BUT OF COURSE: We need to be sure that our effort will be honored in that
bug fixes will make it into the official distribution! Another example:
wouldn't it be great to see MP_FIT appear in the official online help?
Although they would have to loosen copyright on those routines which
have a user component, I believe...
Nice start for a week!
Martin
--
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