FreeMat: VARARGOUT Variable Output Arguments

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VARARGOUT Variable Output Arguments

Section: Functions and Scripts

# Usage

FreeMat functions can return a variable number of output arguments by setting the last argument in the argument list to `varargout`. This special keyword indicates that the number of return values is variable. The general syntax for a function that returns a variable number of outputs is

      function [out_1,...,out_M,varargout] = fname(in_1,...,in_M)

The function is responsible for ensuring that `varargout` is a cell array that contains the values to assign to the outputs beyond `out_M`. Generally, variable output functions use `nargout` to figure out how many outputs have been requested.

# Example

This is a function that returns a varying number of values depending on the value of the argument.

         varoutfunc.m

    function [varargout] = varoutfunc
      switch(nargout)
        case 1
          varargout = {'one of one'};
        case 2
          varargout = {'one of two','two of two'};
        case 3
          varargout = {'one of three','two of three','three of three'};
      end

Here are some examples of exercising `varoutfunc`:

    --> [c1] = varoutfunc
    c1 =
    one of one
    --> [c1,c2] = varoutfunc
    c1 =
    one of two
    c2 =
    two of two
    --> [c1,c2,c3] = varoutfunc
    c1 =
    one of three
    c2 =
    two of three
    c3 =
    three of three