--- a/scripts/ChangeLog
+++ b/scripts/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+2000-11-16  Paul Kienzle <pkienzle@kienzle.powernet.co.uk>
+
+	* plot/contour.m: Reorder args for Matlab compatibility.
+
 2000-10-27  Mats Jansson  <mats.e.jansson@home.se>
 
 	* set/create_set.m: Avoid empty matrix in matrix list warning.

--- a/scripts/plot/contour.m
+++ b/scripts/plot/contour.m
@@ -18,7 +18,8 @@
 ## 02111-1307, USA.
 
 ## -*- texinfo -*-
-## @deftypefn {Function File} {} contour (@var{z}, @var{n}, @var{x}, @var{y})
+## @deftypefn {Function File} {} contour (@var{z}, @var{n})
+## @deftypefnx {Function File} {} contour (@var{x}, @var{y}, @var{z}, @var{n})
 ## Make a contour plot of the three-dimensional surface described by
 ## @var{z}.  Someone needs to improve @code{gnuplot}'s contour routines
 ## before this will be very useful.
@@ -28,17 +29,19 @@
 
 ## Author: jwe
 
-function contour (z, n, x, y)
-
-  if (nargin == 1)
-    n = 10;
-  endif
+function contour (x, y, z, n)
 
   ## XXX FIXME XXX -- these plot states should really just be set
   ## temporarily, probably inside an unwind_protect block, but there is
   ## no way to determine their current values.
 
   if (nargin == 1 || nargin == 2)
+    z = x;
+    if (nargin == 1) 
+      n = 10;
+    else
+      n = y; 
+    endif
     if (is_matrix (z))
       gset nosurface;
       gset contour;

--- a/src/ChangeLog
+++ b/src/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,14 @@
+2000-11-16  Paul Kienzle  <pkienzle@kienzle.powernet.co.uk>
+
+	* file-io.cc (Ffprintf): If no file id parameter, don't return
+	count of characters if nargout is 0 (for compatibility with
+	Matlab).
+
+2000-11-16  Ben Sapp  <bsapp@lanl.gov>
+
+	* DLD-FUNCTIONS/rand.cc (do_rand): Declare loop counter as
+	volatile int, not just volatile.
+
 2000-10-31  John W. Eaton  <jwe@bevo.che.wisc.edu>
 
 	* load-save.cc (skip_comments): Allow % as comment character too.

--- a/src/DLD-FUNCTIONS/rand.cc
+++ b/src/DLD-FUNCTIONS/rand.cc
@@ -298,7 +298,7 @@
       Matrix rand_mat (n, m);
 
       for (volatile int j = 0; j < m; j++)
-	for (volatile i = 0; i < n; i++)
+	for (volatile int i = 0; i < n; i++)
 	  {
 	    double val;
 	    switch (current_distribution)

--- a/src/file-io.cc
+++ b/src/file-io.cc
@@ -630,7 +630,7 @@
   return retval;
 }
 
-DEFUN (fprintf, args, ,
+DEFUN (fprintf, args, nargout,
   "-*- texinfo -*-\n\
 @deftypefn {Built-in Function} {} fprintf (@var{fid}, @var{template}, @dots{})\n\
 This function is just like @code{printf}, except that the output is\n\
@@ -638,6 +638,7 @@
 @end deftypefn")
 {
   double retval = -1.0;
+  bool return_char_count = true;
 
   int nargin = args.length ();
 
@@ -646,8 +647,16 @@
       octave_stream os;
       int fmt_n = 0;
 
-      if (args(0).is_string ())
-	os = octave_stream_list::lookup (1, "fprintf");
+      if (args(0).is_string ()) 
+	{
+	  os = octave_stream_list::lookup (1, "fprintf");
+
+	  // For compatibility with Matlab, which does not return the
+	  // character count when behaving like printf (no file id
+	  // parameter).
+
+	  return_char_count = (nargout != 0);
+	}
       else
 	{
 	  fmt_n = 1;
@@ -679,7 +688,10 @@
   else
     print_usage ("fprintf");
 
-  return retval;
+  if (return_char_count)
+    return retval;
+  else
+    return octave_value();
 }
 
 DEFUN (fputs, args, ,