How to deal with name/value pairs of function arguments in MATLAB

I have a function that takes optional arguments as name/value pairs.

function example(varargin)
% Lots of set up stuff
vargs = varargin;
nargs = length(vargs);
names = vargs(1:2:nargs);
values = vargs(2:2:nargs);

validnames = {'foo', 'bar', 'baz'};    
for name = names
   validatestring(name{:}, validnames);
end

% Do something ...
foo = strmatch('foo', names);
disp(values(foo))
end

example('foo', 1:10, 'bar', 'qwerty')

It seems that there is a lot of effort involved in extracting the appropriate values (and it still isn't particularly robust again badly specified inputs). Is there a better way of handling these name/value pairs? Are there any helper functions that come with MATLAB to assist?

Solution 1:

I prefer using structures for my options. This gives you an easy way to store the options and an easy way to define them. Also, the whole thing becomes rather compact.

function example(varargin)

%# define defaults at the beginning of the code so that you do not need to
%# scroll way down in case you want to change something or if the help is
%# incomplete
options = struct('firstparameter',1,'secondparameter',magic(3));

%# read the acceptable names
optionNames = fieldnames(options);

%# count arguments
nArgs = length(varargin);
if round(nArgs/2)~=nArgs/2
   error('EXAMPLE needs propertyName/propertyValue pairs')
end

for pair = reshape(varargin,2,[]) %# pair is {propName;propValue}
   inpName = lower(pair{1}); %# make case insensitive

   if any(strcmp(inpName,optionNames))
      %# overwrite options. If you want you can test for the right class here
      %# Also, if you find out that there is an option you keep getting wrong,
      %# you can use "if strcmp(inpName,'problemOption'),testMore,end"-statements
      options.(inpName) = pair{2};
   else
      error('%s is not a recognized parameter name',inpName)
   end
end

Solution 2:

InputParser helps with this. See Parse Function Inputs for more information.

Solution 3:

I could yack for hours about this, but still don't have a good gestalt view of general Matlab signature handling. But here's a couple pieces of advice.

First, take a laissez faire approach to validating input types. Trust the caller. If you really want strong type testing, you want a static language like Java. Try to enforce type safety every where in Matlab, and you'll end up with a good part of your LOC and execution time devoted to run time type tests and coercion in userland, which trades in a lot of the power and development speed of Matlab. I learned this the hard way.

For API signatures (functions intended to be called from other functions, instead of from the command lines), consider using a single Args argument instead of varargin. Then it can be passed around between multiple arguments without having to convert it to and from a comma-separated list for varargin signatures. Structs, like Jonas says, are very convenient. There's also a nice isomorphism between structs and n-by-2 {name,value;...} cells, and you could set up a couple functions to convert between them inside your functions to whichever it wants to use internally.

function example(args)
%EXAMPLE
%
% Where args is a struct or {name,val;...} cell array

Whether you use inputParser or roll your own name/val parser like these other fine examples, package it up in a separate standard function that you'll call from the top of your functions that have name/val signatures. Have it accept the default value list in a data structure that's convenient to write out, and your arg-parsing calls will look sort of like function signature declarations, which helps readability, and avoid copy-and-paste boilerplate code.

Here's what the parsing calls could look like.

function out = my_example_function(varargin)
%MY_EXAMPLE_FUNCTION Example function 

% No type handling
args = parsemyargs(varargin, {
    'Stations'  {'ORD','SFO','LGA'}
    'Reading'   'Min Temp'
    'FromDate'  '1/1/2000'
    'ToDate'    today
    'Units'     'deg. C'
    });
fprintf('\nArgs:\n');
disp(args);

% With type handling
typed_args = parsemyargs(varargin, {
    'Stations'  {'ORD','SFO','LGA'}     'cellstr'
    'Reading'   'Min Temp'              []
    'FromDate'  '1/1/2000'              'datenum'
    'ToDate'    today                   'datenum'
    'Units'     'deg. C'                []
    });
fprintf('\nWith type handling:\n');
disp(typed_args);

% And now in your function body, you just reference stuff like
% args.Stations
% args.FromDate

And here's a function to implement the name/val parsing that way. You could hollow it out and replace it with inputParser, your own type conventions, etc. I think the n-by-2 cell convention makes for nicely readable source code; consider keeping that. Structs are typically more convenient to deal with in the receiving code, but the n-by-2 cells are more convenient to construct using expressions and literals. (Structs require the ",..." continuation at each line, and guarding cell values from expanding to nonscalar structs.)

function out = parsemyargs(args, defaults)
%PARSEMYARGS Arg parser helper
%
% out = parsemyargs(Args, Defaults)
%
% Parses name/value argument pairs.
%
% Args is what you pass your varargin in to. It may be
%
% ArgTypes is a list of argument names, default values, and optionally
% argument types for the inputs. It is an n-by-1, n-by-2 or n-by-3 cell in one
% of these forms forms:
%   { Name; ... }
%   { Name, DefaultValue; ... }
%   { Name, DefaultValue, Type; ... }
% You may also pass a struct, which is converted to the first form, or a
% cell row vector containing name/value pairs as 
%   { Name,DefaultValue, Name,DefaultValue,... }
% Row vectors are only supported because it's unambiguous when the 2-d form
% has at most 3 columns. If there were more columns possible, I think you'd
% have to require the 2-d form because 4-element long vectors would be
% ambiguous as to whether they were on record, or two records with two
% columns omitted.
%
% Returns struct.
%
% This is slow - don't use name/value signatures functions that will called
% in tight loops.

args = structify(args);
defaults = parse_defaults(defaults);

% You could normalize case if you want to. I recommend you don't; it's a runtime cost
% and just one more potential source of inconsistency.
%[args,defaults] = normalize_case_somehow(args, defaults);

out = merge_args(args, defaults);

%%
function out = parse_defaults(x)
%PARSE_DEFAULTS Parse the default arg spec structure
%
% Returns n-by-3 cellrec in form {Name,DefaultValue,Type;...}.

if isstruct(x)
    if ~isscalar(x)
        error('struct defaults must be scalar');
    end
    x = [fieldnames(s) struct2cell(s)];
end
if ~iscell(x)
    error('invalid defaults');
end

% Allow {name,val, name,val,...} row vectors
% Does not work for the general case of >3 columns in the 2-d form!
if size(x,1) == 1 && size(x,2) > 3
    x = reshape(x, [numel(x)/2 2]);
end

% Fill in omitted columns
if size(x,2) < 2
    x(:,2) = {[]}; % Make everything default to value []
end
if size(x,2) < 3
    x(:,3) = {[]}; % No default type conversion
end

out = x;

%%
function out = structify(x)
%STRUCTIFY Convert a struct or name/value list or record list to struct

if isempty(x)
    out = struct;
elseif iscell(x)
    % Cells can be {name,val;...} or {name,val,...}
    if (size(x,1) == 1) && size(x,2) > 2
        % Reshape {name,val, name,val, ... } list to {name,val; ... }
        x = reshape(x, [2 numel(x)/2]);
    end
    if size(x,2) ~= 2
        error('Invalid args: cells must be n-by-2 {name,val;...} or vector {name,val,...} list');
    end

    % Convert {name,val, name,val, ...} list to struct
    if ~iscellstr(x(:,1))
        error('Invalid names in name/val argument list');
    end
    % Little trick for building structs from name/vals
    % This protects cellstr arguments from expanding into nonscalar structs
    x(:,2) = num2cell(x(:,2)); 
    x = x';
    x = x(:);
    out = struct(x{:});
elseif isstruct(x)
    if ~isscalar(x)
        error('struct args must be scalar');
    end
    out = x;
end

%%
function out = merge_args(args, defaults)

out = structify(defaults(:,[1 2]));
% Apply user arguments
% You could normalize case if you wanted, but I avoid it because it's a
% runtime cost and one more chance for inconsistency.
names = fieldnames(args);
for i = 1:numel(names)
    out.(names{i}) = args.(names{i});
end
% Check and convert types
for i = 1:size(defaults,1)
    [name,defaultVal,type] = defaults{i,:};
    if ~isempty(type)
        out.(name) = needa(type, out.(name), type);
    end
end

%%
function out = needa(type, value, name)
%NEEDA Check that a value is of a given type, and convert if needed
%
% out = needa(type, value)

% HACK to support common 'pseudotypes' that aren't real Matlab types
switch type
    case 'cellstr'
        isThatType = iscellstr(value);
    case 'datenum'
        isThatType = isnumeric(value);
    otherwise
        isThatType = isa(value, type);
end

if isThatType
    out = value;
else
    % Here you can auto-convert if you're feeling brave. Assumes that the
    % conversion constructor form of all type names works.
    % Unfortunately this ends up with bad results if you try converting
    % between string and number (you get Unicode encoding/decoding). Use
    % at your discretion.
    % If you don't want to try autoconverting, just throw an error instead,
    % with:
    % error('Argument %s must be a %s; got a %s', name, type, class(value));
    try
        out = feval(type, value);
    catch err
        error('Failed converting argument %s from %s to %s: %s',...
            name, class(value), type, err.message);
    end
end

It is so unfortunate that strings and datenums are not first-class types in Matlab.