Octave Quick Reference Octave Version 1.1.

1 Killing and Yanking Strings and Common Escape Sequences

C-k kill to the end of the line A string constant consists of a sequence of characters enclosed
Starting Octave C-y yank the most recently killed text in either double-quote or single-quote marks.
octave start interactive Octave session M-d kill to the end of the current word
\\ a literal backslash
octave file run Octave on commands in file M-DEL kill the word behind the cursor
\" a literal double-quote character
octave --help describe command line options M-y rotate the kill ring and yank the new top
\’ a literal single-quote character
\n newline, ASCII code 10
Stopping Octave Command Completion and History \t horizontal tab, ASCII code 9
quit or exit exit Octave TAB complete a command or variable name
INTERRUPT (e.g. C-c) terminate current command M-? list possible completions Index Expressions
and return to top-level prompt RET enter the current line
var (idx) select elements of a vector
C-p move ‘up’ through the history list
var (idx1, idx2) select elements of a matrix
C-n move ‘down’ through the history list
Getting Help M-< move to the first line in the history
scalar select row (column) corresponding to
help list all commands and built-in variables scalar
M-> move to the last line in the history vector select rows (columns) corresponding to the
help command briefly describe command C-r search backward in the history list elements of vector
help -i use Info to browse Octave manual C-s search forward in the history list range select rows (columns) corresponding to the
help -i command search for command in Octave manual
history [-q] [N ] list N previous history lines, omitting elements of range
history numbers if -q : select all rows (columns)
Motion in Info
history -w [file] write history to file (~/.octave hist if
SPC or C-v scroll forward one screenful
no file argument) Global Variables
DEL or M-v scroll backward one screenful
history -r [file] read history from file (~/.octave hist if global var1 ... Declare variables global.
C-l redraw the display
no file argument) Global variables may be accessed inside the body of a
edit history lines edit and then run previous commands function without having to be passed in the function
Node Selection in Info parameter list provided they are also declared global within
from the history list
n select the next node
run history lines run previous commands from the history the function.
p select the previous node
list
u select the ‘up’ node Selected Built-in Variables
t select the ‘top’ node
[beg ] [end ] Specify the first and last history
commands to edit or run. EDITOR editor to use with edit history
d select the directory node
If beg is greater than end, reverse the list of commands Inf, NaN IEEE infinity, NaN
< select the first node in the current file
before editing. If end is omitted, select commands from LOADPATH path to search for function files
> select the last node in the current file
beg to the end of the history list. If both arguments are PAGER program to use to paginate output
g reads the name of a node and selects it
omitted, edit the previous item in the history list. ans last result not explicitly assigned
C-x k kills the current node
eps machine precision
Searching in Info Shell Commands pi π
cd dir change working directory to dir realmax maximum representable value
s search for a string realmin minimum representable value
pwd print working directory
C-s search forward incrementally
C-r search backward incrementally ls [options] print directory listing automatic replot automatically redraw plots
i search index & go to corresponding node getenv (string) return value of named environment do fortran indexing Fortran-style indexing of matrices
, go to next match from last ‘i’ command variable implicit str to num ok allow strings to become numbers
system (cmd) execute arbitrary shell command string output max field width maximum numeric field width
Command-Line Cursor Motion output precision min significant figures displayed
Matrices page screen output control whether output is paged
C-b move back one character
Square brackets delimit literal matrices. Commas separate prefer column vectors create column vectors by default
C-f move forward one character
elements on the same row. Semicolons separate rows. Commas resize on range error automatic resizing of matrices
C-a move the the start of the line
may be replaced by spaces, and semicolons may be replaced by save precision digits stored by save command
C-e move to the end of the line
one or more newlines. Elements of a matrix may be arbitrary silent functions suppress output from functions
M-f move forward a word
expressions, provided that all the dimensions agree. warn divide by zero suppress divide by zero errors
M-b move backward a word
C-l clear screen, reprinting current line at top [ x, y, ... ] enter a row vector commas in literal matrix
[ x; y; ... ] enter a column vector control handling of spaces in matrices
Inserting or Changing Text [ w, x; y, z ] enter a 2×2 matrix
ignore function time stamp
M-TAB insert a tab character
ignore changes in function files during session
DEL delete character to the left of the cursor Ranges
C-d delete character under the cursor ok to lose imaginary part
base : limit
C-v add the next character verbatim allow complex to real conversion
base : incr : limit
C-t transpose characters at the point prefer zero one indexing
Specify a range of values beginning with base with no
M-t transpose words at the point if ambiguous, prefer 0-1 style indexing
elements greater than limit. If it is omitted, the default
value of incr is 1. Negative increments are permitted.
[] surround optional arguments ... show one or more arguments
Copyright 1996, 1997 John W. Eaton Permissions on back
Arithmetic and Increment Operators Statements Linear Algebra
x + y addition for identifier = expr stmt-list endfor chol (a) Cholesky factorization
x - y subtraction Execute stmt-list once for each column of expr. The det (a) compute the determinant of a matrix
x * y matrix multiplication variable identifier is set to the value of the current column eig (a) eigenvalues and eigenvectors
x .* y element by element multiplication during each iteration. expm (a) compute the exponential of a matrix
x / y right division, conceptually equivalent to hess (a) compute Hessenberg decomposition
(inverse (y’) * x’)’ while (condition) stmt-list endwhile inverse (a) invert a square matrix
x ./ y element by element right division Execute stmt-list while condition is true. norm (a, p) compute the p-norm of a matrix
x \ y left division, conceptually equivalent to pinv (a) compute pseudoinverse of a
inverse (x) * y break exit innermost loop qr (a) compute the QR factorization of a matrix
x .\ y element by element left division continue go to beginning of innermost loop
rank (a) matrix rank
x ^ y power operator return return to calling function
schur (a) Schur decomposition of a matrix
x .^ y element by element power operator svd (a) singular value decomposition
- x negation if (condition) if-body [else else-body] endif syl (a, b, c) solve the Sylvester equation
+ x unary plus (a no-op)
Execute if-body if condition is true, otherwise execute else-
x ’ complex conjugate transpose
x .’ transpose
body. Equations, ODEs, DAEs, Quadrature
++ x (-- x) increment (decrement) x, return new value if (condition) if-body [elseif (condition) elseif-body] endif *fsolve solve nonlinear algebraic equations
x ++ (x --) increment (decrement) x, return old value Execute if-body if condition is true, otherwise execute the *lsode integrate nonlinear ODEs
elseif-body corresponding to the first elseif condition that *dassl integrate nonlinear DAEs
is true, otherwise execute else-body. *quad integrate nonlinear functions
Assignment Expressions
Any number of elseif clauses may appear in an if
var = expr assign expression to variable perror (nm, code) for functions that return numeric codes,
statement.
var (idx) = expr assign expression to indexed variable print error message for named function
unwind protect body unwind protect cleanup cleanup end and given error code
Comparison and Boolean Operators Execute body. Execute cleanup no matter how control exits * See the on-line or printed manual for the complete list of
These operators work on an element-by-element basis. Both body. arguments for these functions.
arguments are always evaluated.
x < y true if x is less than y Defining Functions Signal Processing
x <= y true if x is less than or equal to y fft (a) Fast Fourier Transform using FFTPACK
x == y true if x is equal to y function [ret-list] function-name [ (arg-list) ] ifft (a) inverse FFT using FFTPACK
x >= y true if x is greater than or equal to y function-body freqz (args) FIR filter frequency response
x > y true if x is greater than y endfunction sinc (x) returns sin (π x)/(π x)
x != y true if x is not equal to y
x & y true if both x and y are true ret-list may be a single identifier or a comma-separated list of Image Processing
x | y true if at least one of x or y is true identifiers delimited by square-brackets.
colormap (map) set the current colormap
! bool true if bool is false arg-list is a comma-separated list of identifiers and may be
gray2ind (i, n) convert gray scale to Octave image
empty.
Short-circuit Boolean Operators image (img, zoom) display an Octave image matrix
imagesc (img, zoom) display scaled matrix as image
Operators evaluate left-to-right, expecting scalar operands. Basic Matrix Manipulations imshow (img, map) display Octave image
Operands are only evaluated if necessary, stopping once overall
rows (a) return number of rows of a imshow (i, n) display gray scale image
truth value can be determined. Operands are converted to
columns (a) return number of columns of a imshow (r, g, b) display RGB image
scalars by applying the all function.
all (a) check if all elements of a nonzero ind2gray (img, map) convert Octave image to gray scale
x && y true if both x and y are true any (a) check if any elements of a nonzero
ind2rgb (img, map) convert indexed image to RGB
x || y true if at least one of x or y is true find (a) return indices of nonzero elements
loadimage (file) load an image file
sort (a) order elements in each column of a
rgb2ind (r, g, b) convert RGB to Octave image
Operator Precedence sum (a) sum elements in columns of a
prod (a) product of elements in columns of a saveimage (file, img, fmt, map) save a matrix to file
Here is a table of the operators in Octave, in order of
increasing precedence. min (args) find minimum values
max (args) find maximum values
Sets
; , statement separators
rem (x, y) find remainder of x/y create set (a, b) create row vector of unique values
= assignment, groups left to right complement (a, b) elements of b not in a
reshape (a, m, n) reformat a to be m by n
|| && logical “or” and “and” intersection (a, b) intersection of sets a and b
| & element-wise “or” and “and” union (a, b) union of sets a and b
diag (v, k) create diagonal matrices
< <= == >= > != relational operators
: colon linspace (b, l, n) create vector of linearly-spaced elements
+ - addition and subtraction logspace (b, l, n) create vector of log-spaced elements Strings
* / \ .* ./ .\ multiplication and division eye (n, m) create n by m identity matrix strcmp (s, t) compare strings
’ .’ transpose ones (n, m) create n by m matrix of ones strcat (s, t, ...) concatenate strings
+ - ++ -- ! unary minus, increment, logical “not” zeros (n, m) create n by m matrix of zeros
^ .^ exponentiation rand (n, m) create n by m matrix of random values
C-style Input and Output Basic Plotting
fopen (name, mode) open file name gplot [ranges] expr [using] [title] [style] 2D plotting
fclose (file) close file
printf (fmt, ...) formatted output to stdout gsplot [ranges] expr [using] [title] [style] 3D plotting
fprintf (file, fmt, ...) formatted output to file ranges specify data ranges
sprintf (fmt, ...) formatted output to string expr expression to plot
scanf (fmt) formatted input from stdin using specify columns to plot
fscanf (file, fmt) formatted input from file title specify line title for legend
sscanf (str, fmt) formatted input from string style specify line style
fgets (file, len) read len characters from file If ranges are supplied, they must come before the expression
fflush (file) flush pending output to file to plot. The using, title, and style options may appear in any
ftell (file) return file pointer position order after expr . Multiple expressions may be plotted with a
frewind (file) move file pointer to beginning single command by separating them with commas.
freport print a info for open files set options set plotting options
fread (file, size, prec) read binary data files show options show plotting options
fwrite (file, size, prec) write binary data files replot redisplay current plot
feof (file) determine if pointer is at EOF closeplot close stream to gnuplot process
A file may be referenced either by name or by the number purge tmp files clean up temporary plotting files
returned from fopen. Three files are preconnected when automatic replot built-in variable
Octave starts: stdin, stdout, and stderr.
Other Plotting Functions
Other Input and Output functions plot (args) 2D plot with linear axes
save file var ... save variables in file semilogx (args) 2D plot with logarithmic x-axis
load file load variables from file semilogy (args) 2D plot with logarithmic y-axis
disp (var) display value of var to screen loglog (args) 2D plot with logarithmic axes
bar (args) plot bar charts
Miscellaneous Functions stairs (x, y) plot stairsteps
eval (str) evaluate str as a command hist (y, x) plot histograms
feval (str, ...) evaluate function named by str, passing
remaining args to called function title (string) set plot title

error (message) print message and return to top level

axis (limits) set axis ranges
xlabel (string) set x-axis label
clear pattern clear variables matching pattern
ylabel (string) set y-axis label
exist (str) check existence of variable or function
who list current variables grid [on|off] set grid state
hold [on|off] set hold state
Polynomials ishold return 1 if hold is on, 0 otherwise
compan (p) companion matrix
conv (a, b) convolution mesh (x, y, z) plot 3D surface
deconv (a, b) deconvolve two vectors meshdom (x, y) create mesh coordinate matrices
poly (a) create polynomial from a matrix
polyderiv (p) derivative of polynomial
polyreduce (p) integral of polynomial
polyval (p, x) value of polynomial at x
polyvalm (p, x) value of polynomial at x
roots (p) polynomial roots
Edition 1.1for Octave Version 1.1.1. Copyright 1996, John W.
residue (a, b) partial fraction expansion of ratio a/b
Eaton (jwe@che.utexas.edu). The author assumes no responsibility
for any errors on this card.
Statistics
corrcoef (x, y) correlation coefficient This card may be freely distributed under the terms of the GNU
cov (x, y) covariance General Public License.
mean (a) mean value TEX Macros for this card by Roland Pesch (pesch@cygnus.com),
median (a) median value originally for the GDB reference card
std (a) standard deviation
var (a) variance Octave itself is free software; you are welcome to distribute copies
of it under the terms of the GNU General Public License. There is
absolutely no warranty for Octave.