MATLAB: Pick up elements from a cell array and the result must be a cell array

Question

I want to pick up all elements of a cell array except the last element. When I do V{1:end-1}, the result seems not to be a cell array.

Answer 1

With a cell array, {} operates on the content of the cells, () operates on the cell array itself.

So, to crop a cell array:

newcellarray = yourcellarray(1:end-1);

Note that

yourcellarray{indices}

retuns a comma separated list of the content of the cells indexed by indices.

edit: so a convoluted way of also cropping the cell array (as long as it is a row cell vector) would be:

newcellarray = {yourcellarray{1:end-1}};

which would unpack all the elements but the last into a comma-separated list and repack it into a new cell array. A bit convoluted!