Why do I receive a "Maximum recursion limit of 500 reached" error when I try to SET or GET a dynamic property using an anonymous function in MATLAB 7.6 (R2008a)?

I have a class defined as follows:

classdef testClassDynProps<dynamicprops

      methods

          function obj=testClassDynProps

              metaProp = obj.addprop('testProp');

              metaProp.SetMethod = @(obj,val) (testClassDynPropsSetMet(obj,val));

              metaProp.GetMethod = @(obj) (testClassDynPropsGetMet(obj));

          end % constructor

      end

end

I invoke this as follows:

t=testClassDynProps;

t.testProp = 3; % this will result in infinite recursion

a = t.testProp; % this will result in infinite recursion

I receive the following error message:

 ??? Maximum recursion limit of 500 reached. Use set(0,'RecursionLimit',N)

 to change the limit.  Be aware that exceeding your available stack space can

 crash MATLAB and/or your computer.

 Error in ==> testClassDynProps>@(obj,val)(testClassDynPropsSetMet(obj,val))

The Set and Get methods of a dynamic property created with addprops in a subclass of dynamicprops create infinite recursions, because the Get/Set functions call themselves.

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

This change has been incorporated into the documentation in MATLAB 7.8 (R2009a).

 For previous releases, read below for any additional information:

This is expected behavior based on how SET/GET functions and anonymous functions work. Only the SET/GET functions can SET/GET the actual property values. An anonymous function that calls another function to do the actual work cannot SET/GET the actual property value just as an ordinary SET/GET function cannot call another function to SET/GET the actual property.

To work around this issue, invoke the function as follows:

metaProp.SetMethod = @testClassDynPropsSetMet;

metaProp.GetMethod = @testClassDynPropsGetMet;