Structured Programming and Applications Lecture 7

These flashcards cover key terms and concepts from the lecture on structured programming, focusing on advanced functions, variable arguments, and recursion.

Variable Arguments

Functions can take a variable number of input and output arguments using cell arrays varargin and varargout.

nargin

A built-in function that returns the number of input arguments passed to a function.

nargout

A built-in function that returns the number of output arguments expected from a function.

Nested Functions

Functions that are defined inside another function and can access variables from the outer function without passing them.

Anonymous Function

A simple, one-line function that does not need to be stored in a separate file, often used for short calculations.

Function Handle

A variable that stores the reference to a function, allowing the function to be passed as an argument to another function.

Recursive Function

A function that calls itself to solve smaller instances of the same problem, typically involving a base case to stop recursion.

Function Functions

Functions that accept other functions as input, enabling higher-order function operations.

feval

A built-in function that evaluates a function handle and executes the function for given arguments.

fplot

A built-in function that plots a continuous curve of a function between specified limits without needing separate x and y vectors.

Factorial Function

An example of recursion, where the factorial of a number n is defined in terms of the factorial of n-1.