Constructing a circular type of matrix

I want a matrix that is of the form:

Right now I am doing it as follows:

w = rand(M,N)
for i = 1:M
        for j = 1:N
            u = max(i,j);
            w(i,j) = u;
        end
end

But I don't like using the double for loops. Is there another way?

Answer 1

[Stephen23]

For MATLAB versions >=R2016b:

>> M = max((1:4).',1:5)
M =
   1   2   3   4   5
   2   2   3   4   5
   3   3   3   4   5
   4   4   4   4   5

For earlier versions:

>> [X,Y] = ndgrid(1:4,1:5);
>> M = max(X,Y)
M =
   1   2   3   4   5
   2   2   3   4   5
   3   3   3   4   5
   4   4   4   4   5