MATLAB Programming Fundamentals - MathWorks

numArrays = 10;

A = cell(numArrays,1);

for n = 1:numArrays

A{n} = magic(n);

end

Access the data in the cell array by indexing with curly braces. For example, display the

fifth element of A:

A{5}

ans =

17 24 1 8 15

23 5 7 14 16

4 6 13 20 22

10 12 19 21 3

11 18 25 2 9

The assignment statement A{n} = magic(n) is more elegant and efficient than this call

to eval:

eval(['A', int2str(n),' = magic(n)']) % Not recommended

For more information, see:

• “Create Cell Array” on page 12-3


• “Create Structure Array” on page 11-2

Files with Sequential Names

Related data files often have a common root name with an integer index, such as

myfile1.mat through myfileN.mat. A common (but not recommended) use of the eval

function is to construct and pass each file name to a function using command syntax, such

as

eval(['save myfile',int2str(n),'.mat']) % Not recommended

The best practice is to use function syntax, which allows you to pass variables as inputs.

For example:

currentFile = 'myfile1.mat';

save(currentFile)

2 Program Components