Re: Messages[] Problem/bug?
- To: mathgroup at christensen.Cybernetics.NET (Mathgroup )
- Subject: [mg368] Re: Messages[] Problem/bug?
- From: strimmer at zi.biologie.uni-muenchen.de (Korbinian Strimmer)
- Date: Tue, 27 Dec 1994 22:31:24 +0100
Xah Lee writes
> I found this following strange thing. It could be classified as a bug. It
> is 100% reproducible on my Mma student v.2.1 for Mac.
>
> When I excute the following Messages[Plus] or Messages[Power], mma returs
> an empty list {}. Then I excute ?Plus, mma returns the appropriate usage
> message for plus. Now I execute Messages[Plus] again, the appropriate
> usage message appears.
> What is wrong? Is this a bug?
On the Macintosh Mma only builds a thin kernel instead of a full kernel.
That means that it doesn't load all definitions at startup time. If you
look into the Packages:StartUp folder you see the two files that contain
the usage and error messages, infothin.m and msgthin.m respectively.
You just have to load these two files explicitly when you start Mma, and
your error will disappear. It is most comfortable to write
Get["infothin.m"];
Get["msgthin.m"];
into the initialization cell in the init.m file (located in the Packages
folder) so that this is done every time at startup.
Korbinian Strimmer
Department of Zoology, Munich