Add Interactive Tasks to a Live Script

What Are Live Editor Tasks?

Live Editor tasks are apps that can be added to a live script to perform a specific set of operations. You can add tasks to live scripts to explore parameters and automatically generate code. Use tasks to reduce development time, errors, and time spent plotting.

Tasks represent a series of MATLAB^® commands. You can display their output either inline or on the right. To see the MATLAB commands that the task runs, show the generated code.

Insert Tasks

To add a task to a live script, go to the Live Editor tab, click Task , and select from the available tasks. You also can type the name of the task in a live script code block. As you type, the Live Editor displays possible matches, and you can select and insert the desired task. For example, create a live script that creates a vector of data containing an outlier.

A = [57 59 60 100 59 58 57 58 300 61 62 60 62 58 57];
plot(1:15,A)

Add the Clean Outlier Data task to your live script to smooth the noisy data and avoid skewed results. To add the task, start typing the word clean in the live script and select Clean Outlier Data from the suggested command completions. In the task, set Input data to A. The task identifies and fills two outliers in the data and creates the variable cleanedData in the MATLAB workspace with the stored results. You also can see the results in the output plot for the task. Continue modifying additional parameters until you are satisfied with the results.

Restore Default Parameters

To restore all parameter values back to their defaults, click the options button at the top-right of the task and select Restore Default Values.

Collapse Tasks for Improved Readability

When you are done modifying parameters, you can collapse the task to help with readability. To collapse the task, click the arrow at the top-left of the task.

The task displays as a single, user-readable line of pseudocode with output.

Delete Tasks

To delete a task, click the task and then press Delete or Backspace. You also can place your cursor directly before or after the task and use the Delete or Backspace key, respectively.

Run Tasks and Surrounding Code

By default, as you modify the value of parameters in the task, the task and current section (including other tasks in the section) run automatically. This ensures that the results and surrounding code in the section remain up to date. For example, in the live script cleanmydata.mlx, the entire section including the code that creates the vector of noisy data reruns every time you modify the value of a parameter in the Clean Outlier Data task. To run only the task, add section breaks before and after the task. For more information about sections and how to add section breaks, see Run Sections in Live Scripts.

A green circular icon at the top-right of the task indicates that the task runs automatically when you modify the task parameters.

To disable running the section automatically, click the autorun icon. The icon updates to display the disabled state. To run the task and current section, on the Live Editor tab, click the Run Section button.

Some tasks do not run automatically by default. This default setting ensures optimal performance for those tasks.

Modify Output Argument Name

To modify the name of the output argument, click the text box containing the argument name and enter a new name.

You can use the resulting output argument in subsequent code, including as inputs to additional Live Editor tasks.

View and Edit Generated Code

To see the MATLAB commands that the task runs, click the options button at the top-right of the task and select either Controls and Code or Code Only. You also can use the down arrow at the bottom of the task to show and hide the generated code. The generated code is read-only.

To edit the generated code, click the options button and select Convert Task to Editable Code. This option removes the task and replaces it with the generated code, which you then can edit.

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