How to replace a function by a value

So I have a series of functions that all depend on an initial function. For example, I want to design a helicopter. I have a program that gives an initial weight estimate. This weight estimate is used by other programs to figure out how big my wings, transmission, and rotors are going to be. I, then, have another program that calculates a new weight based on the size of these geometric properties. I would like this value from this new output to be the next input into the geometric sizing programs that originally took in the value of my initial weight estimation program.

Answer 1

[the cyclist]

Conceptually, something like this?

weightEstimate = initialWeightEstimate
while <some condition>
    geometryEstimate = geometricEstimatorFunction(weightEstimate,<other inputs to geometry estimator>)
    weightEstimate = weightEstimatorFunction(geometryEstimate,<otherinputs to weight estimator>)
end

[Albert Garcia]

Yeah, this seems right. So I would need my weightEstimatorFunction to be inside the initialWeightEstimate function, and I guess if I run the initialWeightEstimate function and it detects that the geometricEstimatorFunction function has been run already, initialWeightEstimate would output the value from weightEstimatorFunction. How would I end up getting my initialWeightEstimate function to figure out that I already had geometricEstimatorFunction be run? Is there a way for me to get a "true"/"false" value from checking to see if a function has been run?

[Albert Garcia]

Would the best solution be to have my initialWeightEstimate function have a loop like below?

weightEstimate = initialWeightEstimate
int = 0;
for int < 10
    if int<1
        weightEstimate = initialWeightEstimate;
    else
        weightEstimate = weightEstimatorFunction(geometryEstimate);
    end
geometryEstimate = geometricEstimatorFunction(weightEstimate);
int = int + 1;
end

[the cyclist]

Yes, this would be a good conceptual solution, if you know the number of iterations you want.

Regarding your "checking to see if a function has been been run" question ... MATLAB will simply run the lines of code in strict order, waiting for the prior one to finish before starting the next one. So, there is no need to check if a prior line has been completed.

[Albert Garcia]

Cool. Thank you very much!