Re: Simulation software package maintainer
> >The "correct" way would be to file a request for packaging (RFP) bug report
> >with the debian BTS. I searched on the bugs.d.o webpage, but could not find
> >anything, so you either have to know where to look or what to look for in
> >your favourite search engine:
> >
> >http://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/
> >
> >You need to file a bug against wnpp, details on that page, copy&paste does
> >not work on my last remaining debian box...
> Given your reply below, is it still worth my while filing the bug, or
> should I let you handle this? That's just a question, I can still
> file a bug, no problems.
If you want to file bug number 400k, go for it, but I can live without
another bug report. I will have a look at it and let you know, if I am still
interested.
I can always file a bug later if you're not interested. If you were
to become interested that would be great!
> >are the plots on the webpage created by
> >xmds, too?
> Actually, no. Not directly. The data is from xmds, however they're
> >from Matlab. xmds has a program which converts its output format (xml
> based, and portable) into matlab or scilab output (which itself uses
> gnuplot).
Thought so, I am reading the manual currently. I hope I can create the plots
also with octave, gnuplot, R, or some other free software?
That should be possible, but you'll have to jump through a couple of
hoops first. Scilab is free, and uses gnuplot, so you can use that
straight off by using the xsil2graphics program which comes with xmds.
xsil2graphics converts the xsil (xml-based) output to something
understandable by matlab or scilab, so you could use the data file
output from that to create graphs from gnuplot or whatever else. In
fact, it would probably be a good idea to add gnuplot output (and
probably R etc) directly from xsil2graphics at some point in the
future. Always good to have another handy wee feature floating around
:-)
Also looking at
the documentation on the webpage, the manual seems to be written in tex, is
the tex code included in the xmds source package?
There's a separate xmds-doc project, and I don't think we bundle the
tex code with the source anymore, however we might be able to make
xmds and xmds-doc packages right?
Is the documentation
"free"? It would be a shame to add a well documented package but being
forced to leave out the documentation because of conflicting definitions of
freeness. I haven't followed debian's policy wrt free documentation
recently, but I think it has become very strict.
It's released under the GPL as well.
> It would also be interesting to see how one could use xmds within a
> teaching curriculum, however that's probably a question for a later
> time.
If I like it, we might actually have a class with this, or at least teach it
in our group. Many students have little or no programming experience, in the
next semester we will have a statistics class again, which was more an
introduction to programming with octave than about statistics. ODEs are
important as well, and after we did a short introduction in the 1.st semester
physics class, a lot of people asked about this already, maybe xmds would be
an option, too. It seems to be fairly easy to use, at least for simple
examples.
It would be interesting to hear how you get on using xmds in teaching.
If you have any questions about xmds use itself, you can either
direct them to me or (even better) to the
xmds-users@lists.sourceforge.net mailing list. The developers are
also research physicists who are *very* helpful when it comes to
helping people solve their problems with xmds, and usually one gets a
reply rather quickly.
Gruß
Paul
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