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=Numerical=
=Numerical=
* Use C++11 <random> libraries for random number generation.  Write link between Octave functions (rand, randi, randn, rande) and C++ API.  Implement RandStream objects as Matlab does.


*Improve logm, and sqrtm (see this thread: http://octave.1599824.n4.nabble.com/matrix-functions-td3137935.html)
*Improve logm, and sqrtm (see this thread: http://octave.1599824.n4.nabble.com/matrix-functions-td3137935.html)
*Use pairwise addition in sum() to mitigate against numerical errors without substantial performance penalty (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pairwise_summation).
*Review implementing algorithm in this 2009 paper (https://epubs.siam.org/doi/pdf/10.1137/080738490) for xsum (sum with extra accuracy).  The existing implementation uses a 2005 paper.


*Improve complex mapper functions. See W. Kahan, ``Branch Cuts for Complex Elementary Functions, or Much Ado About Nothing's Sign Bit (in The State of the Art in Numerical Analysis, eds. Iserles and Powell, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1987) for explicit trigonometric formulae.
*Improve complex mapper functions. See W. Kahan, ``Branch Cuts for Complex Elementary Functions, or Much Ado About Nothing's Sign Bit (in The State of the Art in Numerical Analysis, eds. Iserles and Powell, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1987) for explicit trigonometric formulae.
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=Marketing and Community=
=Marketing and Community=


*Make the website prettier. Maybe a new design, maybe a more "corporate" design (if we're heading down the "paid support for Octave" path.
* Make the Octave website/[[Project Infrastructure]] easier to maintain.
 
** FusionForge's "Submit a Snippet" and "Create A Package" would seem to be directly usable for Agora's "Post a Snippet" and "Share your Code", respectively: https://alioth.debian.org/snippet/.  It is FLOSS.
** ScipyCentral, http://scipy-central.org/ has all the features we need and is also free software.
 
*Move [https://octave.sourceforge.io/ Octave-Forge] to [https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/octave/ Savannah] so everything is hosted in the same place.
 
*For ideas, see the [http://openoffice.apache.org/orientation/intro-marketing.html Apache Open Office Introduction to Marketing]
 
* Help design a user or a developer survey [http://www.openoffice.org/marketing/ooocon2006/presentations/wednesday_c10.pdf]
 
* Help prepare and deliver presentations about Octave at colleges and universities.
 
== Finish the Agora website ==
 
In 2009, the Mathworks decided to restrict the terms of use Matlab Central, a place dedicated to Matlab collaboration. The Mathworks forbade copyleft licenses and using the "free" code found in Matlab central on anything other than Mathworks products (e.g. forbidding from using it on Octave, even if the authors of the code wanted to allow this). Thus Octave users have no place to centrally, quickly, and conveniently share Octave code. See the [[FAQ#Why_can.27t_I_use_code_from_File_Exchange_in_Octave.3F_It.27s_released_under_a_BSD_license.21|FAQ]] for more details.


In response to this, a website started to form, [http://agora.octave.org/ Agora Octave].
* Make it easier for newcomers to contribute.


This should be relatively easy webdev in Python using [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django_%28web_framework%29 Django].
* For marketing ideas, see the [https://openoffice.apache.org/orientation/intro-marketing.html Apache Open Office Introduction to Marketing]


Things to be considered when working on this:
* Help design a user or a [https://www.openoffice.org/marketing/ooocon2006/presentations/wednesday_c10.pdf developer survey]


* [http://octave-forge.blogspot.ie/2012/08/octconf2012-agora-and-pkg.html discussion of Agora during OctConf2012]
* Help prepare and deliver presentations and [[Publications about Octave]] at colleges and universities.
* [http://scipy-central.org/ Scipy Central] - a website with the same objective as Agora for Scipy. Their [https://github.com/scipy/SciPyCentral Code] is released under a BSD license. Might be useful to reuse some parts.


Most of the basic functionality of Agora is already in, but there are many ways in which it could be improved, such as implementing comment threads, giving it an email interface, or a ReSTful API which could be used from Octave for package management. See also [[Agora]]. Talk to [[User:JordiGH|Jordi]]
* Create a [[Forum for GNU Octave]].


== Improve Windows binary packaging ==
== Improve Windows binary packaging ==
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'''Skills Required''': Knowledge of GNU build systems, Makefiles, configure files, chasing library dependencies, how to use a compiler. No m-scripting or C++ necessary, beyond understanding [http://david.rothlis.net/c/compilation_model/ the C++ compilation model].
'''Skills Required''': Knowledge of GNU build systems, Makefiles, configure files, chasing library dependencies, how to use a compiler. No m-scripting or C++ necessary, beyond understanding [http://david.rothlis.net/c/compilation_model/ the C++ compilation model].


== Improve Mac OS X binary packaging ==
== Improve macOS binary packaging ==


We would like to be able to easily generate binary packages for Mac OS X. Right now, it's difficult and tedious to do so. Most OS X users install Octave using one of the source-based package managers such as Homebrew or MacPorts. Any way to help us build a binary package would be appreciated. Required knowledge is understanding how building binaries in Mac OS X works. Our current approach to building binaries for Windows is to cross-compile from a GNU system using [http://mxe.cc/ MXE], something similar may be possible for OS X ([http://lilypond.org/gub/ GUB]?).
We would like to be able to easily generate binary packages for macOS. Right now, it's difficult and tedious to do so. Most OS X users install Octave using one of the source-based package managers such as Homebrew or MacPorts. Any way to help us build a binary package would be appreciated. Required knowledge is understanding how building binaries in macOS works. Our current approach to building binaries for Windows is to cross-compile from a GNU system using [http://mxe.cc/ MXE], something similar may be possible for OS X ([http://lilypond.org/gub/ GUB]?).


'''Skills Required''': Knowledge of GNU build systems, Makefiles, configure files, chasing library dependencies, how to use a compiler. If you choose to work on GUB, Python will be required. No m-scripting or C++ necessary, beyond understanding [http://david.rothlis.net/c/compilation_model/ the C++ compilation model].
'''Skills Required''': Knowledge of GNU build systems, Makefiles, configure files, chasing library dependencies, how to use a compiler. If you choose to work on GUB, Python will be required. No m-scripting or C++ necessary, beyond understanding [http://david.rothlis.net/c/compilation_model/ the C++ compilation model].

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