[R] Re: Matlab to R ?

[Duncan Temple Lang]

As Martin mentions, a fool-proof, automated translator from
Octave/Matlab to S is unlikely to be complete.  A very different
approach is to leave the existing code in Octave/Matlab and call it
from S.  That is "guaranteed" to have the "same" semantics.  As luck
would have it, I have implemented the basic interface between R and
Octave which allows Octave users to call R code, and that R code to
call back to Octave. The package is available from
    http://www.omegahat.org/ROctave 

There will be configuration issues and annoying bugs to work out, but
the basic model follows that of all the inter-system interfaces we
have developed and is well established.  What is needed is some users
to try it and report the problems.

I believe that a similar R-Matlab interface is feasible and I hope to
do that over the next month or two.

 D.


Martin Maechler wrote:
> 
> >>>>> "Robin" == Robin Hankin <r.hankin at auckland.ac.nz>
> >>>>>     on Fri, 4 Oct 2002 08:51:23 +1200 writes:
> 
>     Robin> Hello Michel a good place to start would be
>     Robin> R-and-octave.txt, on the contributed section of CRAN
>     Robin> (Octave is the free version of Matlab).
> 
>     Robin> This shows how common Matlab idioms translate to R.
> 
> and I assume you have seen Paul Gilbert's reply, giving "ex"
> translations of a few idioms.
> 
>     Robin> There seem to be more and more people interested in
>     Robin> porting from Matlab/octave to R.  How about a
>     Robin> specialist mailing list?
> 
> I think a few interested people should "sit together" (in cyberspace)
> and try to improve on the current state.
> I've included John Eaton, the author of GNU octave (the free
> matlab `substitute'), because he certainly knows more about the
> matlab "syntax" than any of us (and Kurt who once new a lot
> about octave).
> 
> Probably everyone agrees that a Matlab -> R translation cannot
> (and probably should not) be automated to full extent.  On the
> other hand, Paul Gilbert's "ex" script should be made into a
> perl or python {or "octave" !?} script and could be enhanced
> considerably, probably.
> 
> It could help matlab/octave users switch to R.
> Another reason I'm interested to some extent is the
> Statistics+Matlab community & software ("Wavelets", "Smoothers" etc)
> where I would like us to get better connected to.
> 
>     Robin> How about a specialist mailing list?
> 
> Not sure if this is needed and makes sense;  I have already set up a dozen
> R-SIG-* (R Special Interest Group in ****) mailing lists and
> only a few are somewhat active.
> But then it may make sense for a short time?
> 
>     MichelA> I have a matlab program. I would like to transfer code in
>     MichelA> R. Is there any translator ?  Thanks for your help
> 
> --
> Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch>	http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/
> Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum  LEO C16	Leonhardstr. 27
> ETH (Federal Inst. Technology)	8092 Zurich	SWITZERLAND
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-- 
_______________________________________________________________

Duncan Temple Lang                duncan at research.bell-labs.com
Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies    office: (908)582-3217
700 Mountain Avenue, Room 2C-259  fax:    (908)582-3340
Murray Hill, NJ  07974-2070       
         http://cm.bell-labs.com/stat/duncan
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