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+## Copyright (C) 2000  Etienne Grossmann
+##
+## This file is part of Octave.
+##
+## Octave is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+## under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
+## the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option)
+## any later version.
+##
+## Octave is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
+## WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+## MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
+## General Public License for more details.
+##
+## You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
+## along with Octave; see the file COPYING.  If not, write to the Free
+## Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA
+## 02110-1301, USA.
+
+## -*- texinfo -*-
+## @deftypefn {Built-in Function} {} [@var{v1},...] =
+## @code{getfield (@var{s}, 'k1',...)} extract fields from a structure.
+## For example
+##
+## @example
+## @group
+## ss(1,2).fd(3).b=5;
+## getfield(ss,@{1,2@},'fd',@{3@},'b')
+## @result{} ans = 5
+## @end group
+## @end example
+##
+## Note that this function could be written as
+##
+## @example
+##          i1= @{1,2@}; i2= 'fd'; i3= @{3@}; i4= 'b';
+##          ss( i1@{:@} ).( i2 )( i3@{:@} ).( i4 )
+## @end example
+## @seealso{setfield,rmfield,isfield,isstruct,fields,struct}
+## @end deftypefn
+
+## Author: Etienne Grossmann <etienne@cs.uky.edu>
+
+function s = getfield (s, varargin)
+
+  for idx = 1:nargin-1
+    i = varargin{idx};
+    if (iscell (i))
+      s = s(i{:});
+    else
+      s = s.(i);
+    endif
+  endfor
+
+endfunction
+
+%!test
+%! x.a = "hello";
+%! assert(getfield(x,"a"),"hello");
+%!test
+%! ss(1,2).fd(3).b = 5;
+%! assert(getfield(ss,{1,2},'fd',{3},'b'),5)