Error using eval Must be a text scalar Error when Matlab is running Dynare driver code

General DSGE Modeling Replication Attempts
1

Hi,

I’m trying to run Thomas Winberry’s code for solving Krusell-Smith (see attached). When I run the dynamics.m file, when Dynare is running I get an error that says:

Error using eval
Must be a text scalar.

Error in firstOrderDynamics_polynomials.driver (line 3386)
M_.params(iParam) = eval(['economicParameters.' parameterName]);

Error in dynare (line 281)
    evalin('base',[fname '.driver']);

Error in dynamics (line 74)
	dynare firstOrderDynamics_polynomials

I assume this is a Dynare error because the firstOrderDynamics_polynomials.driver is m code generated by Matlab. I have run it on Dynare 5.0 and 5.1 on matlab 2020b. How should I fix this? Thanks for your help,

Cameron

winberryAlgorithmCodes.zip (1010.1 KB)

2

That looks like an incompatibility in the toolkit with recent Dynare versions.

3

Have you find any solution for this?

4

An updated version for Dynare 5 is available at

2 Likes
5

Thank you so much @jpfeifer.

6

Reason:

this error occur when the variable name is not string, in this line of driver.m file:

M_.params(i) = eval([‘pp.’ name]);

and the variable name is generated by another line of driver.m file:

name = deblank(M_.param_names(i,:));

when M_.param_names(i,:) is cell, the variable name would not be string.

Solution:

You can set a breakpoint in this line of dynare.m:

evalin(‘base’,[fname ‘.driver’]);

then run your code. when it pause, open the corresponding driver.m file, and modify the name = deblank(M_.param_names(i,:)); to:

name = deblank(M_.param_names{i,:});

then save and continue. Dynare will finish its work.

7

@einheria As pointed out above, the reason is that Dynare moved from strings to cell arrays in version 4.6. That’s why I provided an updated version of the toolkit to account for that.

8

Bravo! It seems like I missed something important. Cos I just downloaded the latest version and encounter same problem, I thought your update wont fix it.

Thank you so much! I dont need to manully fix it now :smile: