# Array Declarations¶

## Syntax¶

Array declaration syntax is very simple. The syntax is the same as for a normal variable declaration except the variable name should be followed by subscripts to specify the size of each dimension of the array. The general form for an array declaration would be:

VariableType varName[dim1, dim2, ..., dimN];


where VariableType is a Modelica type like Real or Integer, varName is the name of the variable.

## Integer Sizes¶

Normally, the dimension specifications are simply integers that indicate the size of that dimension. For example:

Real x[5];


In this case, x is an array of real valued numbers with only one dimension of size 5. It is possible to use parameters or constants specify the size of an array, e.g.,

parameter Integer d1=5;
constant Integer d2=2;
Real x[d1, d2];


As we will see shortly when we discuss the various Array Functions in Modelica, we can even use the size function to specify the size of one array in terms of another array. Consider the following:

Real x[5];
Real y[size(x,1)];


In this case, y will have one dimension of size 5. The use of the function size(x,1) will return the size of dimension 1 of the array x. There are many applications where it is useful to express that the dimensions of different arrays are related in this way (e.g., ensuring that arrays are sized such that operations like matrix multiplication are possible).

## Unspecified Dimensions¶

There are some circumstances where we can leave the size of an array unspecified so that it can be specified by some later context. For example, we will see examples of this later when we discuss Functions that have arguments which are arrays.

To indicate that the size of a given array dimension is not (yet) known, we can use the : symbol as the dimension. So in a declaration like this:

Real A[:,2];


we are declaring an array with two dimensions. The size of the first dimension is not specified. However, the size of the second dimension is definitively specified as 2. In effect, we have declared that A is a matrix with an unspecified number of rows and two columns.

## Non-Integer Dimensions¶

### Enumerations¶

As we saw in our Chemical System examples, another way to specify the dimension for an array is with an enumeration. If an enumeration is used to specify a dimension, then the size of that dimension will be equal to the number of possible values for that enumeration. In our forthcoming discussion on Array Indexing, we’ll see how to properly index an array that uses enumerations as dimensions.

### Booleans¶

It is also possible to declare an array where a dimension is specified as Boolean, e.g.,

Real x[Boolean];