Does any elegant way to pass augments through nested function calls

Hello,

I encountered some case of code which written like follows.

The problem is the augments are difficult to handle if these are named lengthy.

My question is does any ways keep the function structure but easier to handle and debug?

script.m

b = 1;
c = 2;
d = 3;
e = 4;
f = 5;
g = 6;
h = 7;
i = 8;
j = 9;
k = 'nest';
a = nestb(b,c,d,e,f,g,h,i,j,k)

nestb.m

function varargout = nestb(varargin)
    b = varargin{1}
    c = varargin{2}
    d = varargin{3}
    e = varargin{4}
    f = varargin{5}
    g = varargin{6}
    h = varargin{7}
    i = varargin{8}
    j = varargin{9}
    k = varargin{10}
    if numel{varargin} > 10
        test = varargin{11}
        qq = varargin{12}
        ww = varargin{13}
    end
    
    if b > 0
        tmpb = b + nestc(c,d,e,f)
    else
        tmpb = nestc(c,d,e,f)
    end
    varargout{1} = tmpb;
end

nestc.m

function varargout = nestc(varargin)
    c = varargin{1}
    d = varargin{2}
    e = varargin{3}
    f = varargin{4}
    g = varargin{5}
    h = varargin{6}
    i = varargin{7}
    j = varargin{8}
    k = varargin{9}

    if c > 0
        tmpc = c + nestd(d,e,f,g,h,i,j,k)
    else
        tmpc = nestd(d,e,f,g,h,i,j,k)
    end
    varargout{1} = tmpc;
end

nestd.m

function varargout = nestd(varargin)
    d = varargin{1}
    e = varargin{2}
    f = varargin{3}
    g = varargin{4}
    h = varargin{5}
    i = varargin{6}
    j = varargin{7}
    k = varargin{8}
    
    if isnumeric(k)
        tmpd = d + e + f + g + h + i + j + k;
    else
        tmpc = d + e + f + g + h + i + j;
    end
    varargout{1} = tmpd;
end

Answer 1

[Adam Danz]

Instead of using vargin, you could include one input that is either a cell array or a structure.

Example using cell array

allInputs = {1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,'nest',[],[],[]}
a = nestb(allInputs)

function varargout = nestb(allInputs)
    % b will always be allInputs{1}
    % k will always be allInputs{11} (and it might be empty)
    % to determine which inputs are not empty:   ~cellfun(@isempty, allInputs)
    if allInputs{1} > 0
        tmpb = allInputs{1} + nestc(allInputs{2:5})
    else
        tmpb = nestc(allInputs{2:5})
    end
    varargout{1} = tmpb;
end

Example using structure

allInputs.b = 1;
allInputs.c = 2;
allInputs.d = 3;  %etc...
allInputs.k = 'nest'; 
a = nestb(allInputs)

function varargout = nestb(allInputs)
    % test will always be allInputs{11} and it might be empty 
    % to determine if a field exists:   isfield(allInputs, 'fieldname')
    if allInputs.b > 0
        tmpb = allInputs.b + nestc(allInputs) %adapt nestc() to handle structure input
    else
        tmpb = nestc(allInputs)
    end
    varargout{1} = tmpb;
end

[Yan-ting Chen]

Thank you for your solution.