Passing both the the variable name and value to a function

Hello,

I wonder if there is a way to pass not only the value of a variable, but also it's name to a function.

For example, if I have four variables of any type, say a = 1; b = 2; c =3; d =2;

and I have a random function that takes variable number of arguments, for example: randfun

If I used the command out = randfun(a,b,d) for example, the values and types of a, b, d will be stored in the varargin in the workspace.

Is there any way to also know the name (in char type) of the the arguments?

Thank you

Answer 1

[Andrew Newell]

You can use inputname inside the function to find the names of the variables.

[Mohamed Abdalmoaty]

Thank you Andrew.

[owr]

Didnt know about that one - thanks Andrew!

Answer 2

[owr]

One solution might be to pass all your input arguments as fields in one structure.

For example, define your input arguments like this:

inputargs.a = 1
inputargs.b = 2

Pass the structure as a single input to your function:

out = randfun(inputargs)

Then within the body of the function "randfun" you can get access to both the variable names and values like this:

>> varnames = fieldnames(inputargs)

varnames = 

      'a'
      'b'

Get access to the name of the first input:

>> varnames{1}

ans =

a

Get access to its value:

>> inputargs.(varnames{1})

ans =

       1

Also check out the "inputparser" class in base MATLAB if your version is new enough

[Mohamed Abdalmoaty]

Thank you for the answer