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Introduction
Comma-separated lists are really very simple. You use them all the time. Here is one:
a,b,c,d
That is a comma-separated list containing four variables, the variables a, b, c, and d. Every time you write a list separated by commas then you are writing a comma-separated list. Most commonly you would write a comma-separated list as inputs when calling a function:
fun(a,b,c,d)
or as arguments to the concatenation operator or cell construction operator:
[a,b,c,d]
{a,b,c,d}
or as function outputs:
[a,b,c,d] = fun();
It is very important to understand that in general a comma-separated list is NOT one variable (but it could be). However, sometimes it is useful to create a comma-separated list from one variable (or define one variable from a comma-separated list), and MATLAB has several ways of doing this from various container array types:
1) from a field of a structure array using dot-indexing:
struct_array.field % all elements
struct_array(idx).field % selected elements
2) from a cell array using curly-braces:
cell_array{:} % all elements
cell_array{idx} % selected elements
3) from a string array using curly-braces:
string_array{:} % all elements
string_array{idx} % selected elements
Note that in all cases, the comma-separated list consists of the content of the container array, not subsets (or "slices") of the container array itself (use parentheses to "slice" any array). In other words, they will be equivalent to writing this comma-separated list of the container array content:
content1, content2, content3, .. , contentN
and will return as many content arrays as the original container array has elements (or that you select using indexing, in the requested order). A comma-separated list of one element is just one array, but in general there can be any number of separate arrays in the comma-separated list (zero, one, two, three, four, or more). Here is an example showing that a comma-separated list generated from the content of a cell array is the same as a comma-separated list written explicitly:
>> C = {1,0,Inf};
>> C{:}
ans =
1
ans =
0
ans =
Inf
>> 1,0,Inf
ans =
1
ans =
0
ans =
Inf
How to Use Comma-Separated Lists
Function Inputs: Remember that every time you call a function with multiple input arguments you are using a comma-separated list:
fun(a,b,c,d)
and this is exactly why they are useful: because you can specify the arguments for a function or operator without knowing anything about the arguments (even how many there are). Using the example cell array from above:
>> vertcat(C{:})
ans =
1
0
Inf
which, as we should know by now, is exactly equivalent to writing the same comma-separated list directly into the function call:
>> vertcat(1,0,Inf)
ans =
1
0
Inf
How can we use this? Commonly these are used to generate vectors of values from a structure or cell array, e.g. to concatenate the filenames which are in the output structure of dir:
S = dir(..);
F = {S.name}
which is simply equivalent to
F = {S(1).name, S(2).name, S(3).name, .. , S(end).name}
Or, consider a function with multiple optional input arguments:
opt = {'HeaderLines',2, 'Delimiter',',', 'CollectOutputs',true);
fid = fopen(..);
C = textscan(fid,'%f%f',opt{:});
fclose(fid);
Note how we can pass the optional arguments as a comma-separated list. Remember how a comma-separated list is equivalent to writing var1,var2,var3,..., then the above example is really just this:
C = textscan(fid,'%f%f', 'HeaderLines',2, 'Delimiter',',', 'CollectOutputs',true)
with the added advantage that we can specify all of the optional arguments elsewhere and handle them as one cell array (e.g. as a function input, or at the top of the file). Or we could select which options we want simply by using indexing on that cell array. Note that varargin and varargout can also be useful here.
Function Outputs: In much the same way that the input arguments can be specified, so can an arbitrary number of output arguments. This is commonly used for functions which return a variable number of output arguments, specifically ind2sub and gradient and ndgrid. For example we can easily get all outputs of ndgrid, for any number of inputs (in this example three inputs and three outputs, determined by the number of elements in the cell array):
C = {1:3,4:7,8:9};
[C{:}] = ndgrid(C{:});
which is thus equivalent to:
[C{1},C{2},C{3}] = ndgrid(C{1},C{2},C{3});
Further Topics:
MATLAB documentation:
https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/matlab_prog/comma-separated-lists.html
https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/matlab_prog/access-multiple-elements-of-a-nonscalar-struct-array.html
https://www.mathworks.com/company/newsletters/articles/matlab-tips-and-tricks-exploiting-the-comma-separated-list-vectorizing-cell-array-and-structure-references.html
Click on these links to jump to relevant comments below:
Dynamic Indexing (indexing into arrays with arbitrary numbers of dimensions)
Nested Structures (why you get an error trying to index into a comma-separated list)
Summary
Just remember that in general a comma-separated list is not one variable (although they can be), and that they are exactly what they say: a list (of arrays) separated with commas. You use them all the time without even realizing it, every time you write this:
fun(a,b,c,d)
I'm trying to solve one problem in Cody, but a function 'fmincon' is not recognized by the online compiler. Is there any way to use functions in optimization toolbox in Cody?
Mariola Camacho Lie
Mariola Camacho Lie
Last activity on 23 Oct 2021

Problemas in Cody Area

I already solved some problems in Cody, why does he not increase my points or allow me to earn badges?
I need to put a number of problems on MATLAB cody under same Problem group, as many other people have done.
Can anyone please help me on this.
Let's say MathWorks decides to create a MATLAB X release, which takes a big one-time breaking change that abandons back-compatibility and creates a more modern MATLAB language, ditching the unfortunate stuff that's around for historical reasons. What would you like to see in it?
I'm thinking stuff like syntax and semantics tweaks, changes to function behavior and interfaces in the standard library and Toolboxes, and so on.
(The "X" is for major version 10, like in "OS X". Matlab is still on version 9.x even though we use "R20xxa" release names now.)
What should you post where?
Wishlist threads (#1 #2 #3 #4 #5): bugs and feature requests for Matlab Answers
Frustation threads (#1 #2): frustrations about usage and capabilities of Matlab itself
Missing feature threads (#1 #2): features that you whish Matlab would have had
Next Gen threads (#1): features that would break compatibility with previous versions, but would be nice to have
@anyone posting a new thread when the last one gets too large (about 50 answers seems a reasonable limit per thread), please update this list in all last threads. (if you don't have editing privileges, just post a comment asking someone to do the edit)
I created a problem in Cody that approximates e. To test the user's solution, I compare their solution to e. What I want to do instead is compare the user's solution to my reference solution. The question is how do I call the reference solution in the test suite?
This is currently my test suite.
sol=exp(1);
y_correct = playgame();
assessVariableEqual('y_correct',sol);
I created several problems recently in CODY. Some of them got removed automatically. I was curious as to why.
It is possible that the problems used latex in their description, so I am not sure if that was the reason they got rejected by the cody server.
Muhtasim Haque Nahian
Muhtasim Haque Nahian
Last activity on 27 May 2021

My problems are vanished

I created some problems last night and created a group too. All those are now missing.
Also my ranking progress, activites, badges earned last night are missing too.
Tungky Subroto
Tungky Subroto
Last activity on 28 Feb 2021

Cody challenges for Simulink ?

Hi all,
I hope everyone is doing well and keeping safe. I was wondering, are there any Cody challenges for Simulink these days?
I saw a post from 2015 (https://blogs.mathworks.com/simulink/2015/08/07/modeling-and-simulation-challenge-in-cody/) and it seems there was a Simulink or "Modeling and Simulation Challenge" problem group, but I couldn't find this group anymore. Perhaps I missing something?
Thank you beforehand.
Tungky
Is anyone else disappointed with uifigures? It seems apparent that these will eventually replace traditional figures, but there is still so much that doesn't quite work. I've tinkered with uifigures since their introduction in release 2016a, but even in 2020a I can't reliably export a uifigure to a graphics file. Sure it works sometimes, but not if a uipanel is present. The exportgraphics command is not as powerful as the print command, leaving some graphic formats (such as *.svg and *.eps) unsupported. How do you generate graphic files of a specific size? You can't even use subplots without overriding the default AutoResizeChildren setting!
Everything with uifigures seems to be slower and less stable than the figure variant. App Designer is much better than GUIDE, but that is not exactly high praise. I would rather generate "apps" programatically across several files instead of dealing with a single-file class definition containing 1000+ lines.
Where is this transition going? MATLAB graphics are moving away from Java in favor of JavaScript, and I'm not sure that we are at all ready for that.
I see this solution on the Cody solutions list. Solution 1949216
I am puzzled as to how this could possibly be rated as correct (size 48)
(BTW - I am pretty sure I saw this, or similar, before.)
function ans = fileread(varargin)
' ';
a=1;
b=3;
a=1;
b=3;a=1;
b=3;a=1;
b=3;a=1;
b=3; end
It's pretty odd how a solution that uses more characters than usual can be the "leading solution" of a Cody problem and have the least size. Compare these two codes that find the sum of integers from 1 to 2^x, which one uses fewer characters, thus should be the better solution?
function y = sum_int(x)
regexp '' '(?@y=sum(1:2^x);)'
end
function ans = sum_int(x)
sum(1:2^x)
end
Meta threads have a tendency to grow large. This has happened several times before (the wishlist threads #1 #2 #3 #4 #5, and 'What frustrates you about MATLAB?' #1 and #2).
No wonder that a thread from early 2011 has also kept growing. After just under a decade there are (at time of writing) 119 answers, making the page slow to load and navigate (especially on mobile). So after a friendly nudge; here is a new thread for the things that are missing from Matlab.
Same question: are there things you think should be possible in Matlab, but aren't? What things are possible with software packages similar to Matlab that Matlab would benefit from? (note that you can also submit an enhancement request through support, although I suspect they will be monitoring activity on this thread as well)
What should you post where?
Wishlist threads (#1 #2 #3 #4 #5): bugs and feature requests for Matlab Answers
Frustation threads (#1 #2): frustations about usage and capabilities of Matlab itself
Missing feature threads (#1 #2): features that you whish Matlab would have had
Next Gen threads (#1): features that would break compatibility with previous versions, but would be nice to have
@anyone posting a new thread when the last one gets too large (about 50 answers seems a reasonable limit per thread), please update this list in all last threads. (if you don't have editing privileges, just post a comment asking someone to do the edit)
Even
Even
Last activity on 23 Jul 2023

Problem 44951. Verify Law of Large Numbers

If a large number of fair N-sided dice are rolled, the average of the simulated rolls is likely to be close to the mean of 1,2,...N i.e. the expected value of one die. For example, the expected value of a 6-sided die is 3.5.
Given N, simulate 1e8 N-sided dice rolls by creating a vector of 1e8 uniformly distributed random integers. Return the difference between the mean of this vector and the mean of integers from 1 to N.
function dice_diff = loln(N)
A=randi([1,N],1e8,1)
M=mean(A)
B=1:N
m=mean(B)
dice_diff =abs(M-m);
end
Here is my code, but it can't work out as it needs too long time to creat A.
In problem 16 I used the following solution:
function b = nearZero(a)
b = max(a(imdilate(a == 0, [1 1 1])));
end
It is working pretty well on mathlab but when I submit my answer to cody, the following error is generated:
Undefined function 'imdilate' for input arguments of type 'double'.
Error in nearZero (line 2)
b = max(a(imdilate(a == 0, [1 1 1])));
Error in Test1 (line 3)
assert(isequal(nearZero(a),b))
In number 5, its written that the correct answer is c = 1 but the secomnd person has more change than the first person, therefor the correct answer should be 2.Likewise in number 6.
Hi, I'm trying to solve this problem but I'm getting an error so far.
Problem:
Given a vector a, find the number(s) that is/are repeated consecutively most often. For example, if you have
a = [1 2 2 2 1 3 2 1 4 5 1]
The answer would be 2, because it shows up three consecutive times
What I've written so far (not done):
a = [1 2 2 2 1 3 2 1 4 5 1];
[x,y] = size(a);
counter = zeros(1,10);
if x == 1
for i=1:1:y
if a(i) == a(i+1)
counter(a(i)) = counter(a(i))+1
end
end
else
for i=1:1:x
if a(i) == a(i+1)
counter(a(i)) = counter(a(i))+1
end
end
end
But it says "error" in the line of "if a(i) == a(i+1)". I noticed that it creates a variable called "i" which value is 11, but it should create a vector from 1 to 11. What's wrong here?
I know my solution might not be in the right direction or something, but please don't tell me anything!
Thanks in advance
Rik
Rik
Last activity on 4 Nov 2022

How to create a GUI

There are multiple ways to create a graphical user interface (GUI) in Matlab. Which method is the best depends on multiple factors: the complexity of the project, to what extent it should be a long-term solution, on what releases your GUI should work, your available time, your skill level, and probably other factors I'm forgetting.
To keep the thread clear I'll attempt to provide a short outline a few ways in this question, and leave the details for the answers. (@anyone with editing privileges: feel free to update the section below if I missed something important and am slow in editing this question)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GUIDE
GUIDE is probably the first tool new users will encounter. It is very useful for quickly putting something together, but it is otherwise fairly limited. It requires maintaining (and distributing) both a .m and a .fig file. Note that the GUIDE environment will be removed in a future release. After GUIDE is removed, existing GUIDE apps will continue to run in Matlab but they will not be editable in GUIDE. If you're starting a new GUI, don't use GUIDE. If you're updating an existing GUIDE GUI, migrate it to AppDesigner. In R2021a the first step for this removal was taken: all templates except the blank template have been removed.
GUILT
Although I haven't had a detailed look myself, it seems a list like this is not complete without at least mentioning the GUI Layout Toolbox, which is available on the file exchange and offers a lot of customization options.
Programmatic GUIs
You can bypass GUIDE and use the normal figures and functions like uicontrol to build GUIs from code. This makes the design less visual, but more flexible for future additions.
App Designer
The official successor to GUIDE, AppDesigner is not based on functions, but works similar to a class. It uses uifigure and mostly uses graphical elements that are incompatible with 'normal' GUIs that are created with a figure (or .fig).
This is the 5th installment of the wish-list and bug report thread.
This topic is the follow on to the first Wish-list for MATLAB Answer sections and second MATLAB Answers Wish-list #2 (and bug reports). The third started out as New design of the forum - grey on white and the fourth MATLAB Answers Wish-list #4 (and bug reports) is also growing so large it is slow to load and navigate.
Same idea as the previous ones: one wish (or bug report) per answer, so that people can vote their wishes.
What should you post where?
Wishlist threads (#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6): bugs and feature requests for Matlab Answers
Frustation threads (#1 #2): frustations about usage and capabilities of Matlab itself
Missing feature threads (#1 #2): features that you whish Matlab would have had
Next Gen threads (#1): features that would break compatibility with previous versions, but would be nice to have
@anyone posting a new thread when the last one gets too large (about 50 answers seems a reasonable limit per thread), please update this list in all last threads. (if you don't have editing privileges, just post a comment asking someone to do the edit)