Why do complex matrices display real elements as "1.23e45 + i" when format is set to eng?

There's probably a reasonable reason for this behavior, but I can't seem to understand why this;

format short eng
foo = [2 + 1*i, 3]

prints

foo =
2.0000e+000 +  1.0000e+000i     3.0000e+000 +             i

IE. why 0.0000e+000 isn't printed before the second 'i' character. As it is now the (IMHO) reasonable assumption is that foo(2) is in fact 3+1*i, rather than 3+0*i.

This behavior is not present with the default format mode, where the output is instead an, arguably more reasonable,

foo =
2.0000 + 1.0000i   3.0000 + 0.0000i

Thanks!

[Stephen23]

@Jonathan Lock: what OS and MATLAB version are you using ?

[Stephen23]

MATLAB 2012b:

>> format short
>> foo = [2 + 1*i, 3]
foo =
   2.0000 + 1.0000i   3.0000          
>> format short eng
>> foo
foo =
     2.0000e+000 +  1.0000e+000i     3.0000e+000

[Jonathan Lock]

This is on 9.0.0.341360 (R2016a), running on linux (4.4.0-31-generic #50-Ubuntu SMP Wed Jul 13 00:07:12 UTC 2016 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux). Though FWIW Guillaume states it's a bug (which is what I was hoping for as the current behavior is very confusing ;) ).

Answer 1

[Guillaume]

I can reproduce it with 2016a and 2016b pre.

It is clearly a bug which I'll report to mathworks.

[Jonathan Lock]

Ah, that makes sense. FWIW I'm running 9.0.0.341360 (R2016a) on linux (4.4.0-31-generic #50-Ubuntu SMP Wed Jul 13 00:07:12 UTC 2016 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux). Thanks for the help!

[Guillaume]

I've submitted a bug report and will update here when I get a reply from MathWorks.

[Guillaume]

I've had confirmation by MathWorks that it is indeed a bug. No ETA for a fix.

[Jonathan Lock]

Thanks for the update! Always relieving when the issue isn't PEBCAK-based =)