options in function variables octave

The following octave code shows how to make functions take different paths depending on a user specified choice. It is a little template that comes in handy once in a while.

$cat options_in_function_variables_01.m
# Author : Kamaraju S. Kusumanchi
# Email  : kamaraju at gmail dot com
# Last modified : Tue Jun 15 06:45:15 EDT 2010
function [X] = options_in_function_variables_01(X, choice)

if (strcmp(choice, "square"))
 X = X*X;
elseif (strcmp(choice, "unity"))
 X = X*1;
elseif (strcmp(choice, "cube"))
 X = X*X*X;
else
 printf("choice = %s is not a valid option.\n", choice);
 error("please provide a correct choice");
endif
endfunction

To test it

$octave -qf
octave:1> options_in_function_variables_01(2.2, 'unity')
ans =  2.2000
octave:2> options_in_function_variables_01(2.2, 'square')
ans =  4.8400
octave:3> options_in_function_variables_01(2.2, 'cube')
ans =  10.648
octave:4> 10.648/4.84
ans =  2.2000
octave:5> 4.84/2.2
ans =  2.2000