{"id":1274,"date":"2023-06-15T05:41:50","date_gmt":"2023-06-15T09:41:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/matlab\/?p=1274"},"modified":"2023-06-15T06:50:11","modified_gmt":"2023-06-15T10:50:11","slug":"mathworks-releases-best-practices-for-matlab-toolbox-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/matlab\/2023\/06\/15\/mathworks-releases-best-practices-for-matlab-toolbox-development\/","title":{"rendered":"MathWorks releases Best Practices for MATLAB Toolbox development"},"content":{"rendered":"
Research<\/span> computing can be a messy affair and, for me at least, it often looks like the following. First, there is the exploration phase where you often have no strong idea about what you are doing. You play around with the data or simulation, see what there is to see, learning about both your subject domain and, often, the system you are developing on (<\/span>e.g.<\/span> MATLAB, Python, R <\/span>etc<\/span>) simultaneously. <\/span> <\/span><\/div>
As<\/span> <\/span>our<\/span> understating improves, and the complexity of the narrative increases, the messy script or notebook becomes a tidier one. Structure <\/span>emerges<\/span> in the form of reusable functions and classes, initially<\/span> just for <\/span>ourselves<\/span>, but eventually for other people<\/span>. <\/span>Documentation that starts out as a few scattered comments becomes more coherent and comprehensive<\/span>. <\/span>Your test script evolves into unit tests which become part of a continuous integration process.<\/span> <\/span><\/div>
Your private repository becomes a public one and other people start expressing an interest in your work<\/span>. <\/span>You turn your code into a package to allow others to <\/span>more easily install it<\/span> and a \u2018Getting started\u2019 guide to help onboard them.<\/span> <\/span> <\/span><\/div>
On and on it goes and the realization hits you: Now you are a software engineer as well as a researcher<\/span>. <\/span>A Research Software Engineer<\/span><\/a> maybe? <\/span>Your journey to this point may be different from the one I outlined above but the end point is usually the same:<\/span> <\/span><\/div>
You\u2019ve<\/span> written (or are writing) a MATLAB Toolbox and want to know what the best practices are so you can make it as good as can be<\/span>. <\/span> <\/span><\/div>

Feedback from toolbox authors<\/span> <\/span><\/h2>
Yesterday, we got together with a bunch of <\/span>prominent open-source MATLAB <\/span>toolbox authors and asked them \u201cWhat problems do users have<\/span> with your toolbox?<\/span>\u201d.<\/span> The results were illuminating<\/span> <\/span> <\/span><\/div>
<\/span>\"\"<\/img> <\/span><\/div>
Ideally, everyone could<\/span> develop and release toolboxes in a way that minimised these problems.<\/span> Wouldn\u2019t <\/span>it be great if MathWorks offered advice on how to go about doing that?<\/span> <\/span><\/div>
Well<\/span>, <\/span>we\u2019ve<\/span> got you covered with some new repositories on the MathWorks GitHub organisation<\/span> <\/span><\/div>