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<h4 class="subsection">11.8.4 Overloading and Autoloading</h4>
<p>Functions can be overloaded to work with different input arguments. For
example, the operator '+' has been overloaded in Octave to work with single,
double, uint8, int32, and many other arguments. The preferred way to overload
functions is through classes and object oriented programming
(see <a href="Function-Overloading.html#Function-Overloading">Function Overloading</a>). Occasionally, however, one needs to undo
user overloading and call the default function associated with a specific
type. The <code>builtin</code> function exists for this purpose.
<!-- builtin src/oct-parse.cc -->
<p><a name="doc_002dbuiltin"></a>
<div class="defun">
— Loadable Function: [<small class="dots">...</small>] <b>builtin</b> (<var>f, <small class="dots">...</small></var>)<var><a name="index-builtin-779"></a></var><br>
<blockquote><p>Call the base function <var>f</var> even if <var>f</var> is overloaded to
another function for the given type signature.
</p></blockquote></div>
<p>A single dynamically linked file might define several
functions. However, as Octave searches for functions based on the
functions filename, Octave needs a manner in which to find each of the
functions in the dynamically linked file. On operating systems that
support symbolic links, it is possible to create a symbolic link to the
original file for each of the functions which it contains.
<p>However, there is at least one well known operating system that doesn't
support symbolic links. Making copies of the original file for each of
the functions is undesirable as it increases the
amount of disk space used by Octave. Instead Octave supplies the
<code>autoload</code> function, that permits the user to define in which
file a certain function will be found.
<!-- autoload src/oct-parse.cc -->
<p><a name="doc_002dautoload"></a>
<div class="defun">
— Built-in Function: <b>autoload</b> (<var>function, file</var>)<var><a name="index-autoload-780"></a></var><br>
<blockquote><p>Define <var>function</var> to autoload from <var>file</var>.
<p>The second argument, <var>file</var>, should be an absolute file name or
a file name in the same directory as the function or script from which
the autoload command was run. <var>file</var> should not depend on the
Octave load path.
<p>Normally, calls to <code>autoload</code> appear in PKG_ADD script files that
are evaluated when a directory is added to the Octave's load path. To
avoid having to hardcode directory names in <var>file</var>, if <var>file</var>
is in the same directory as the PKG_ADD script then
<pre class="example"> autoload ("foo", "bar.oct");
</pre>
<p class="noindent">will load the function <code>foo</code> from the file <code>bar.oct</code>. The above
when <code>bar.oct</code> is not in the same directory or uses like
<pre class="example"> autoload ("foo", file_in_loadpath ("bar.oct"))
</pre>
<p class="noindent">are strongly discouraged, as their behavior might be unpredictable.
<p>With no arguments, return a structure containing the current autoload map.
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<p class="noindent"><strong>See also:</strong> <a href="doc_002dPKG_005fADD.html#doc_002dPKG_005fADD">PKG_ADD</a>.
</p></blockquote></div>
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