Getting first element of a function output

Hi everyone,

I am trying to get the value of the first element of an output of a function. For example, The output of my function test is [a1, a2, a3] and I want to get the value of a1 only.

The way I do it is

a = test(input);
result = a(1);

I wonder if there is an easier way to do it. Is there something similar to

result = (test(input))(1);

in matlab?

[Fabien Fellay]

Now, you can do (the less painful solution so far):

result = table(test(input)).Var1(1);

For example, if you want to do:

A = magic(3);
result = A(2,2);

You can do:

result = table(magic(3)).Var1(2,2);

The following is also possible (but longer and ugly):

result = subsref(magic(3),struct('type','()','subs',{{2,2}}));

Answer 1

[Andrei Bobrov]

no easier way

result = subsref(test(input),struct('type','()','subs',{{1}}))

Answer 2

[Daniel Shub]

See this answer about what is missing from MATLAB.

If test is a function you wrote, you could change what it returns. You could also write a wrapper around test:

function a1 = test1(input)
  a = test(input);
  result = a(1);
end

[Jan]

In my opinion this method is easy, clear and efficient.

A modification of the Matlab syntax would be worse due to breaking the backward compatibility. +1