symmetrical character array with only letters

Im trying to make a function that gives a logical true if the character array is symmetrical and logical false if not.

So far I have:

a = 'abba'

isItSym = isequal(a(:),flip(a(:)))

res = isItSym

But for anything that is not A-Z or a-z it needs to come back as logical false and it does not (ex: 'p##p').

Im thinking some sort of if function with an sprintf to split the array up and then find any false values with char(0:64) and so on. Im a little new with matlab tho so im having trouble goin about this. Thanks!

Answer 1

[Voss]

Use isstrprop():

a = 'abba';
isItSym = isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   1

a = 'p##p';
isItSym = isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   0

[Elena]

thank you!

[Voss]

You're welcome!

[Elena]

follow up: how can i say that if the input is empty (ie a = ' ' ) that it's also a logical 0?

[Elena]

is was thinking

if myStr == '';

res = 0

else res = isItSym

but it doesnt seem to be working?

[DGM]

a = 'abba';
isItSym = ~isempty(a) && isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   1

a = 'abbc';
isItSym = ~isempty(a) && isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   0

a = 'a##a';
isItSym = ~isempty(a) && isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   0

a = '';
isItSym = ~isempty(a) && isequal(a(:),flip(a(:))) && all(isstrprop(a(:),'alpha'))

isItSym = logical
   0