Thread Subject: typing clear breaks "help" and other paths

Hello,

I am using R2009b on Mac OS 10.6.2. Recently, (I am guessing after the upgrade to 10.6.2), this strange problem has begun. This happens irrespective of whether I use the MATLAB desktop or the commandline.

Whenever, I type "clear" to clear the workspace, the command line help stops working.
>> help rdivide

rdivide not found.

Use the Help browser Search tab to search the documentation, or
type "help help" for help command options, such as help for methods.

>> help help

No help found for help

Moreover, if I have setup any paths for my programs, those stop working too. The strangest thing is that matlabpath still shows all the directories on the path:
>> matlabpath

MATLABPATH

/Users/abhay/Code/Matlab/RFTracking/res/data
/Users/abhay/Code/Matlab/RFTracking/src/utils
/Users/abhay/Code/Matlab/RFTracking/src/trac
/Users/abhay/Code/Matlab/RFTracking/src/pf
/Users/abhay/Developer/Source/tinyos-2.x/tools/matlab/java
/Users/abhay/Developer/Source/tinyos-2.x/tools/matlab/util
/Users/abhay/Developer/Source/tinyos-2.x/tools/matlab/comm
/Users/abhay/Developer/Source/tinyos-2.x/tools/matlab/apps
/Users/abhay/Developer/Source/tinyos-2.x/tools/matlab
/Users/abhay/Documents/MATLAB
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/general
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/ops
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/lang
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/elmat
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/randfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/elfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/specfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/matfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/datafun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/polyfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/funfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/sparfun
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/scribe
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/graph2d
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/graph3d
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/specgraph
/Applications/MATLAB_R2009b.app/toolbox/matlab/graphics
--more--

Any ideas?

Abhay

I forgot to add one more thing.
The Preferences also stop working. Not just the shortcut (Apple ,), but even if I click the menu, the preferences window does not appear.

Abhay