Passing multiple variables to function in 1 input

Is there any way to pass multiple variables in a single structure/cell/vector/whatever to a function, so that I can avoid writing out all variables and call variables within function shortly by their names (rather than eg. structureName.variableName)?

In other words, instead of this:

 a=1;
 b=2;
 c=3;
 ...
 z=24;

 myFun(a, b, c, ..., z)

(and inside my function:)

 function myFun(a, b, c, ..., z)
 newVal = c % calling variable shortly by its name

I would like to have something like:

 alphabet = struct('a', 1, 'b', 2, 'c', 3, ..., 'z', 24);
 myFun(alphabet)

(and inside my function:)

 function myFun(alphabet)
 newVal = c % calling variable shortly by its name

[Maciej Grybko]

I want to improve clarity of my program. I have 20+ functions and majority of their inputs are the same. Can I store them in 1 object? Or should I use global variables instead?

[Maciej Grybko]

Or maybe saving workspace and loading it at the beginning of every function?

[Stephen23]

"Or should I use global variables instead?"

No.

Global variables are one way that beginners force themselves into writing slow, complex, buggy code.

Answer 1

[madhan ravi]

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/304528-tutorial-why-variables-should-not-be-named-dynamically-eval

[Maciej Grybko]

Thanks. I checked couple of links. For me the best solution is structure array.

 a = 1;
 b = 24;
 c = 349;
 d = 0.07;

 mydata = struct('f', {a, b, c, d})

 [a, b, c, d] = mydata.f

Answer 2

[Matt J]

See my STRUCTVARS FEX tool for unpacking lots of structure fields to separate variables.

[Maciej Grybko]

Thanks Matt. That's what I was looking for. However, I figured out that the same is possible with MATLAB built-in structure arrays.

 a = 1;
 b = 24;
 c = 349;
 d = 0.07;

 mydata = struct('f', {a, b, c, d})

 [a, b, c, d] = mydata.f

Answer 3

[Matt J]

If your variables really are just a long list of scalars, like in your posted example, you should be using vectors to carry them around, e.g.,

X=[a,b,c,d,...,z];

 function myFun(X)
  newVal = X(3)