Question

Hi I hope this question conforms to community guidelines. While working in Matlab I’d really appreciate if the command window had tabs (much like most terminal emulators in Linux). Is available in Matlab or do I have to run different instances of Matlab?

I am running a system which produces plots so running Matlab in text based mode via -nojvm is not possible.

EDIT: Is there a way to get such a feature or do I have to wait for Mathworks to wake up and implement this simple, timesaving tool.

Hmm I think the way Matlab works (with the workspace and the editor) tabs might not be that beneficial in terms of performance as opposed to just running a new instance of Matlab.

Answer 1

In Linux, you can fork new MATLAB instances with unix command and pass the MATLAB command you want to run as a command line argument. If you add & to the end of the unix input string, the new MATLAB instance becomes a background process, so this way from one MATLAB command window you can run commands (with output) in several MATLAB instances, opening a new MATLAB instance for command execution and output.

Here’s the code:

multithread.m:

function multithread(MatlabCommand)
% this is a function to create a new MATLAB instance and run a command in it.
unix([ 'matlab -desktop -r ', MatlabCommand, ' &' ]);
return

testfunction.m:

function testfunction()
fprintf('one two three.\n');
return

Then you can run MATLAB commands in a new instance this way: multithread('testfunction');.