full - Convert sparse matrix to full matrix
Syntax
A = full(S)
Description
A = full(S) converts a sparse matrix S to
full storage organization. If S is a full matrix, it is
left unchanged. If A is full, issparse(A) is 0.
Remarks
Let X be an m-by-n matrix
with nz = nnz(X) nonzero
entries. Then full(X) requires space to store m*n real
numbers while sparse(X) requires space to store nz real
numbers and (nz+n) integers.
On most computers, a real number requires twice as much storage as an
integer. On such computers, sparse(X) requires less storage
than full(X) if the density, nnz/prod(size(X)),
is less than one third. Operations on sparse matrices, however, require more
execution time per element than those on full matrices, so density should
be considerably less than two-thirds before sparse storage is used.
Examples
Here is an example of a sparse matrix with a density of about two-thirds. sparse(S) and full(S) require
about the same number of bytes of storage.
S = sparse(+(rand(200,200) < 2/3));
A = full(S);
whos
Name Size Bytes Class
A 200X200 320000 double array
S 200X200 318432 double array (sparse)
See Also
issparse, sparse
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