Find where two cell arrays of different sizes are equal

I have two cell arrays of different sizes filled with chars. I want to loop through and find the indices of one cell where the char values are equal to each other.

for example,

cell1={'cat','dog','pig','cow','goat'}
cell2={'meow','cat','bark','goat'}

should return 1 and 5 if I loop through cell one.

If these were doubles, I would use

for i=1:size(cell1,2)
    ind=find(cell2==cell1(1,i))
end

but with these variable types I'm having some trouble.

cell2{1,2}==cell1{1,1}

return the logcial True but

find(cell2==cell1{1,1})

returns the error message "Operator == is not supported for opperands type cell". I also tried using cellfun(@isequal, cell1, cell2) but I get an error message because the size and shape of my cells are not equal.

How can I get the desired result using these variable types?

[Stephen23]

"If these were doubles, I would use"

for i=1:size(cell1,2)
    ind=find(cell2==cell1(1,i))
end

The MATLAB approach would be to use ismember, e.g.:

>> A = [99,100,112,111,103];
>> B = [109,99,98,103];
>> find(ismember(A,B))
ans =
   1   5

Which also works for cell arrays of character vectors:

>> A = {'cat','dog','pig','cow','goat'};
>> B = {'meow','cat','bark','goat'};
>> find(ismember(A,B))
ans =
   1   5

[Camille Woicekowski]

Wow, can you tell I learned Python first? Matlab has been all self-taught for me. This is really helpful, thank you!

Answer 1

[Ameer Hamza]

To compare char arrays, strcmp() should be used. However, since you are using the lastest version of MATLAB, so there are easier ways

cell1={'cat','dog','pig','cow','goat'};
cell2={'meow','cat','bark','goat'};

idx = find(any(string(cell1) == string(cell2).'));

Result

>> idx
idx =
     1     5

[Camille Woicekowski]

Perfect, it doesn't even need to loop. Thanks so much!

[Ameer Hamza]

Yes, that is the power of MATLAB vectorization. Most of the things can be done without loops.

I am glad to be of help!

[per isakson]

... or

find( ismember( cell1, cell2 ) )