P573: Matlab

Matlab Resources Help Facilities

Help

Matlab has an extensive help facility, called (surprise!) help. Try using

    help acosh
    help plot
    help help
    help ;

When you type "help punct" it will return help on a long list of "punctuation" facilities. Help files are now getting long enough to quickly scroll off the screen. If that is a problem, enter the command

>> more on;

which will turn on paging, just like the Unix "more" command. I won't tell you how to turn it off ... by now you should be able to find out those things yourself (hint: use "help").

WARNING: the help files in Matlab use capital letters for commands (for example, EIG(A) to find the eigenvalues of A), but you must use lower case letters when calling those functions (for example, eig(A)). Matlab is case-sensitive, but that does not apply in the help files. Usually any examples given in the help file do have the correct case, but in general beware of cut-and-paste from a help file's text.

Since version 5.0 the Matlab command helpwin opens up a separate window for on-line help and navigation. helpdesk brings up a Web browser that gives the full hypertext documentation. The default startup for Matlab actually creates multiple windows, a command window, a help lookup window, and a command history window. Starting up Matlab with the "-nodesktop" option suppresses those and just brings up a command line interface.

Web Resources on Matlab

The following is a partial list of some resources available for learning Matlab, grabbing Matlab files, etc. Mathworks, the company that produces Matlab, has resources on its pages but they are not well organized for trying to learn how to use the package. However, it is a good resource to see the many areas that Matlab has expanded into, and to keep track of "toolboxes". Some of the best material is from the University of Florida, particularly Kermit Sigmon's primer on Matlab.

Kermit Sigmon's Primer is in a Web version now, and provides a tutorial and general guide.
A reference guide to Matlab commands is useful, particularly when you want to learn what commands are available. I frequently stumble onto really useful things by browsing through such lists.
The MATLAB Frequently Asked Questions list is echoed at the University of Florida as well, and by using your Web browser's "find" button it can help answer questions when you are on your own.

All of those resources are best used at a workstation, with one window open to the Web browser, and the other with Matlab running so you can try out commands.

Of course, there is the ancient and antique method of getting info: the newsgroup comp.soft-sys.matlab. This is closely monitored by Mathworks and they typically respond quickly and politely ... to non-trolls at least.

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Started: long ago in a galaxy far away ...

Modified: Mon 10 Oct 2011, 07:19 AM for link updates

Last Modified: Mon 10 Oct 2011, 07:20 AM