I also got the same results in Octave 3.4.3:
Seems to be a harmless compiler bug in octave, when you use the command 'more off' or 'more on' inside a 1 line if statement, a syntax error is thrown.
If you add a newline after the the conditional, or if you surround "more off" inside an eval(...), then it works correctly.
%works correctly, turns off paging screen output
if(1)
more off;
end
%works correctly, prints 3.4.3
if(1) disp(OCTAVE_VERSION); end
%works correctly, prints '1'
if(1) disp([1]); more off; end
%syntax error when parsing "off" in 'more off'.
if(1) more off; endif
%syntax error on parsing 'off' in 'more off;'
if 1 more off; endif
%works correctly, turns off paging screen output
if (1) eval("more off"); endif
The syntax error thrown is: "error: parse error while reading script file".