Defining a Struct with Multiple Elements

[Apteronotus]

Hi

The following structure has 2 elements.

people = struct(...
'name',{'bob', 'john'},...
'numKids',{0, 2}, ...
'kidsage',{[],[12,9]});

each element people(1), people(2) has three frields (name, numKids, kidsage)

Instead of declaring the structure in one line as above, I would like to define it one field at a time.
The closest working example I've been able to come up with is

people = struct

people.('name') = {'bob, 'john'}
people.('numkids') = {0, 2}
people.('kidsage') = {[], [12, 9]}

But defined in this way, the people structure only has one element.
ie.
people(1) =

name: {'bob' 'john'}
numkids: {[0] [2]}
kidsage: {[] [12, 9]}

Can anyone help?

 

[MisterX]

Although the documentation might lead one to believe this functionality exists, (from the text under the heading "Specifying Cell Versus Noncell Values"), it does not seem to exist, at least with version R2009a.

Instead, one may create a cell array and then convert it to a structure.

people_cell_array = cell(2, 3);

people_cell_array(:, 1) = {'bob' ; 'john'};
people_cell_array(:, 2) = {0 ; 2};
people_cell_array(:, 3) = {[] ; [12, 9]};

people = cell2struct(people_cell_array, {'name', 'num_kids', 'kids_age'}, 2);

 

[Apteronotus]

MisterX
Thank you. Your code definitely produces the results that I was looking for.
Do you have any idea why my original code didnt work?

 

[Apteronotus]

Also, what if you wanted to add a new element at a later time. Say

name: 'Mike'
num_kids: 1
kids_age: 3

 

[MisterX]

people(3) = struct('name', 'Mike', 'num_kids', 1, 'kids_age', 3);

 

[Pythagorean]

Fantastic Mr X, I've had issues with this in the past, nice workaround.