GNU parallel not working at all

Question

I have been trying to use GNU parallel for some time, but I have never been able to get it to function at all!

For example, running (in a non-empty directory!):

Answer 1

Had issues running parallel as an external command from FREEMAT (MATLAB lookalike); the argumentFile was not fed to the command properly solved it by:

• Adding --gnu to options
• Not using cmdString syntax involving ["]

Code:

cmdString = 'parallel --gnu command ::: ';
    while j<=jLength
        cmdString = [cmdString argumentFilePath(j,:) ' '];
        j=j+1;
    end
    system(cmdString)

Thank you for that :) Im on Ubuntu 12.04 as well.