Is it possible to use a function with 2 outputs and sometimes with 4 outputs?

And how to order the output variables? [x1,x2,x3,x4] = f(); or [x4,x3,x2,x1] = f();

[Stephen23]

"Is it possible to use a function with 2 outputs and sometimes with 4 outputs?"

Yes.

"And how to order the output variables?"

The order of the output arguments is determined by how they are defined in the function itself. What you call them in the calling workspace is totally irrelevant.

[Adam Danz]

Also see

help varargout

Answer 1

[OCDER]

See this example function as a starting point for how to make functions with variable input/output, and to do a input/output check, etc.

%  EXAMPLE
%  >> [x1, x2, x3, x4] = myfun(0)
%
%  or, to prevent habit of dynamically named variable issue x1, x2, ....,
%  use a cell output like this:
%
%  >> x = cell(1, 4);
%  >> [x{:}] = myfun(0)
%  "x1" is accessed via "x{1}"
%

function varargout = myfun(varargin)

fprintf('There are %d inputs\n', nargin);
fprintf('There are %d outputs\n', nargout);

if nargin < 1
    error('%s: Must have at least 1 input.', mfilename);
end

if ~ismember(nargout, [2, 4])
    error('%s: Must have 2 or 4 outputs.', mfilename);
end

varargout{1} = varargin{1};
varargout{2} = varargin{1} + 1;
varargout{3} = varargin{1} + 2;
varargout{4} = varargin{1} + 3;