Starting a new line

Hi I'm really new to MATLAB. My questions is how to a start a new line without executing the code. For example if I have:

y = 1123414124124124124 (want new line here without executing)

Answer 1

[Meghana Dinesh]

Are you typing your code in the Command Window? Then use "..." and < enter >

But I suggest you start typing your code in a script. (Home > New > Script)

[1582251394]

I have an incredibly long piece of code that only calculates one thing (in the worst way possible). I'm just trying to format it nicer. Thank you I will try out script and see if it helps.

[Walter Roberson]

Note that in modern versions of MATLAB, the "..." operator has an implied seperator before it.

In sufficiently old versions of MATLAB,

[123....
 456]

would have been treated as 123.456. In modern versions of MATLAB, it is treated the same as

[123. ...
 456]

and so would result in [123. 456]

Side note: the parsing of literal constants takes priority over the ... operator. Entering

[123...
 456]

is treated as "123." followed by ".." which is a syntax error.

But

A = 123;
[A...
 456]

would be treated as [A 456] which would be [123 456]

Answer 2

[Francis]

Shift Enter rather than just Enter

[Walter Roberson]

Shift-Enter is especially valueable when entering commands at the command line, as it does indeed start a new line without executing everything that has been entered so-far.

Commands entered in this way can be recalled as a group in the command history, by pressing up-arrow to recall the last of the commands, and then pressing shift-uparrow to bring in each previous line.

However, shift-enter is treated just the same as enter within the editor.

shift-enter does not have the effect of "line continuation" . For example if you enter

a = 123 + 456<shift-enter>
- 789;

then that will be treated as two seperate commands, a = 123 + 456 and -789;

Answer 3

[Andrew]

add ";" at the end, then click enter

[Steven Lord]

That will end the current command (or end the current row, if it appears inside square brackets or curly braces to create a matrix or cell array.)

x = 12345; % This is one statement
y = [1 2; % This ends the first row of matrix y
     3 4]

y = 2×2

1 2 3 4

<mw-icon class=""></mw-icon>

<mw-icon class=""></mw-icon>

z = {'apple'; % This ends the first row of cell array z
     'banana'}

z = 2x1 cell array
    {'apple' }
    {'banana'}

If you want to continue the command on the next line, using ... is probably the right thing to do.

q = 12345 + ... % Continue the statement on the next line
    67890 % These two lines are the equivalent of "q = 12345 + 67890"

q = 80235

See this documentation page for more information on using ... and/or ; in MATLAB.