How octave can replace Matlab in chemometrics

Many chemometricians today are dependent on having access to Matlab for development of algorithms and analysis of data sets. This article describes some of the potential dangers with such a dependency and how it may affect the field of chemometrics as a whole. Instead of using a proprietary scripting language, it is here suggested that the field should find a solution based on free or open source software. The most realistic open source alternative to Matlab today is Octave which covers most of the Matlab syntax and data structures. However, until now it has been lacking an interactive graphics system like Matlab's Handle Graphics (HG) which is very important to chemometricians for viewing data and inspecting results from analyses. To rectify this situation we are developing the Oplot graphics system which is compatible with the HG syntax. The main structure of Oplot is described and how it compares with HG. Not all HG functionality is currently implemented, however the most common functions and objects are available such as figure, axes, line, image, text, plot, subplot, set, get, clf, hold on/off, grid on/off, labels and title. Ensuring that Octave/Oplot is as compatible with Matlab/HG as possible, will make it easier for chemometricians to make a switch. We argue that such a switch to an open source solution is necessary to ensure long term stability and control over our future scientific and technological developments.