4. MATLAB Generation from IDL — The Vortex OpenSplice MATLAB Guide

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# 4. MATLAB Generation from IDL

The DDS MATLAB Integration supports generation of MATLAB classes from IDL. This chapter describes the details of the IDL-MATLAB binding.

## 4.1. Running IDLPP

Compiling IDL into MATLAB code is done using the `-l matlab` switch on idlpp:

    idlpp -l matlab idl-file-to-compile.idl

Generated Artifacts

The following table defines the MATLAB artifacts generated from IDL concepts:

IDL Concept | MATLAB Concept | Comment
--- | --- | ---
module | package | a MATLAB package is a folder starting with ‘+’.
enum | class | a MATLAB .m file.
enum value | enum value |
struct | class | a MATLAB .m file.
field | class property |
typedef |  | IDL typedef’s are inlined.
union | Unsupported |
inheritance | Unsupported |

Datatype mappings

The following table shows the MATLAB equivalents to IDL primitive types:

IDL Type | MATLAB Type
--- | ---
boolean | logical
char | int8
octet | uint8
short | int16
ushort | uint16
long | int32
ulong | uint32
long long | int64
ulong long | uint64
float | single
double | double
string | char
wchar | Unsupported
wstring | Unsupported
any | Unsupported
long double | Unsupported

Implementing Arrays and Sequences in MATLAB

Both IDL arrays and IDL sequences are mapped to MATLAB arrays. MATLAB supports both native array types, which must have homogenenous contents and cell arrays, which may have heterogenous content. In general, IDLPP prefers native arrays, as they support more straight forward type checking. However, some situations require cell arrays. The following table summarizes the cases where IDLPP will generate cell arrays:

Datatype | Sample Syntax | Reason for using cell array
--- | --- | ---
sequence of sequence | sequence<sequence<T>> f; | Nested sequences need not have a homogeneous length
array of sequence | sequence<T> f[N]; | Sequences lengths need not be homogeneous
sequence of array | sequence<A> f; | A multi-dim array makes adding elements too difficult
sequence of string | sequence<string> f; | Nested strings need not have a homogeneous length
string array | string f[N]; | Nested strings need not have a homogeneous length

## 4.2. Limitations of MATLAB Support

The IDL-to-MATLAB binding has the following limitations:

- IDL unions are not supported
- the following IDL data types are not supported: wchar, wstring, any and long double
- arrays of sequences of structures are not supported

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