multiple versions of maxima



Jaime Villate wrote:
> On Sex, 2009-03-20 at 21:58 -0700, Paul Bowyer wrote:
>  
>> I tried your quick fix, but the xmaxima file I have in /usr/local/bin 
>> already has "start-server" in the two places you mentioned should have
>> "start-client."
>>     
> Then you have an old version of xmaxima and the latest release of
> Maxima. Name the copy of xmaxima as xmaxima-new and replace start-server
> by start-client.
>
>   
The copy of xmaxima I have came with "maxima-5.17.1.tar.gz," the souce 
tarball, which I downloaded from 
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=4933&package_id=302886 
and built
on my machine. The build went without a hitch and make check passed all 
of the tests. If I have the wrong version of xmaxima, then the problem 
is in the source tarball. I tried to send xmaxima as an attachment, but 
my message was rejected.

>>  I did as you suggested and created "xmaxima-old" and tried editing 
>> the two values to "start-client" just to see if it might
>> work, but without success.
>>     
> strange! I've just done it with xmaxima 5.14.0 running maxima 5.17post
> and it works. Please try the following two commands:
> maxima -u 5.14.0 -r ":lisp (start-server 4008)"
> maxima -u 5.17.1 -r ":lisp (start-client 4008)"
>
> They should both work showing an %i1 prompt. If they fail, please tell
> us the error messages.
>
>   
The commands I tried in a Konsole window and their output:

This is the output from the xmaxima I renamed and edited. I left the 
name as xmaxima-old.
$ /usr/local/bin/xmaxima-old -u 5.17.1
Warning: argument (start-client not recognized
Warning: argument 4008) not recognized
Maxima 5.17.1 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp CLISP 2.47 (2008-10-23)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
The function bug_report() provides bug reporting information.
(%i1)
NIL
(%i1)


Notice I used 5.13.0, which is the older version on my machine.
$ /usr/bin/maxima -u 5.13.0 -r ":lisp (start-server 4008)"
Warning: argument (start-server not recognized
Warning: argument 4008) not recognized
Maxima 5.13.0 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp CLISP 2.41 (2006-10-13)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
This is a development version of Maxima. The function bug_report()
provides bug reporting information.
(%i1)
NIL
(%i1)


$ /usr/bin/maxima -u 5.13.0 -r ":lisp (start-client 4008)"
Warning: argument (start-client not recognized
Warning: argument 4008) not recognized
Maxima 5.13.0 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp CLISP 2.41 (2006-10-13)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
This is a development version of Maxima. The function bug_report()
provides bug reporting information.
(%i1)
NIL
(%i1)


$ /usr/local/bin/maxima -u 5.17.1 -r ":lisp (start-server 4008)"
Maxima 5.17.1 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp CLISP 2.47 (2008-10-23)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
The function bug_report() provides bug reporting information.
(%i1) jfa: starting server on port 4008
Maxima encountered a Lisp error:


UNIX error 111 (ECONNREFUSED): Connection refused

Automatically continuing.
To reenable the Lisp debugger set *debugger-hook* to nil.
(%i1)


$ /usr/local/bin/maxima -u 5.17.1 -r ":lisp (start-client 4008)"
Maxima 5.17.1 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp CLISP 2.47 (2008-10-23)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
The function bug_report() provides bug reporting information.
(%i1)
Maxima encountered a Lisp error:


EVAL: undefined function START-CLIENT

Automatically continuing.
To reenable the Lisp debugger set *debugger-hook* to nil.
(%i1)

Notice that maxima-5.13.0 doesn't like "start-server" or "start-client" 
and maxima-5.17.1 doesn't like "start-client" so somehow I think xmaxima 
may be trying to call maxima-5.13.0 but by the time I see the output on 
the screen, it has actually called maxima-5.17.1. A wild guess on my part.
>>  I still get the same output as before.
>>     
> your previous output was:
>  "Warning: argument (start-server not recognized"
> that should no longer appear if you replaced start-server by
> start-client
>
>   
My mistake. I overlooked the
"Warning: argument (start-client not recognized," but the rest was the 
same.

>>  I noticed from the surrounding code that it seemed to be for Windows
>> in at least one place, but I'm running PCLinuxOS-2009.1.
>>     
> Yes, I know. I told you to change both occurrences of start-server,
> because if you change only the first one you found, the one for Linux,
> which is the second one, would still be wrong.
>
>  
>> I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it looks like you need to 
>> look a little deeper for the solution.
>>     
> I'm fixing the latest version of Xmaxima in the CVS repository; old
> versions of xmaxima like the one you have cannot be fixed by us; we will
> simply recommend to update to the latest version when I commit it.
>
>   
I've never used CVS. It will be a new experience for me. If the source 
tarball has the wrong version of xmaxima in it, will that be corrected?

> Regards,
> Jaime
>
>
>   

I hope something I'm sending you will shed some light on the problem. I 
apologize for the oversight I made with the "start-client" argument.

Thanks again for all of your effort,

Paul Bowyer