Add variable legend to a plot without for loop

I am plotting two 201x4 arrays, resulting in four 2-d lines. The y array is a time series so I want the legend to vary accordingly. I created a 1x4 cell with strings that show the time variation of my y variable. However, the result is not satisfactory as shown in the figure below:

My code attempt is below:

lgd = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
h2 = plot(x,y,'LineWidth',1.25,'DisplayName',char(lgd)');
legend;

I can easily accomplish what I need with a for loop but I do not want to do that because I think I am close to accomplishing what I need without it.

Please help. Thank you.

Answer 1

[Star Strider]

This appears to work correctly:

x = 0:0.1:10;
y = exp(-(x-(0:4).').^2)./(1:5).';

figure
plot(x, y)
lgd = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
legend(lgd)

EDIT — (11 Mar 2021 at 21:34)

Added plot figure.

.

[Kien Pham]

Thank you. I have a follow-up question after getting that to work. Can you take a look at my comment to Walter Robertson above and see if you have help me a bit further?

[Star Strider]

Yes.

Try this:

x = 0:0.1:10;
y = exp(-(x-(0:3).').^2)./(1:4).';
ya = exp(-(x-(0:3).'+0.1).^2)./(1:4).';

figure
hv = plot(x, y);
hold on
ha = plot(x, ya, '--k');
hold off
lgd = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
legend([ha(1); hv],{'Analytical',lgd{:}})

producing:

.

Answer 2

[Walter Roberson]

N = 20;
x = 1:N;
y = sort(rand(N,4));

lgd = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
h2 = plot(x,y,'LineWidth',1.25);
legend(h2, lgd)

[Kien Pham]

Thank you @Walter Roberson. That helps. I have a follow-up question for you.

Suppose I have an h1 series plotted in which the time variation is not important.

I used the 'DisplayName' switch to name that series while plotting h1. Is there a way to have the legend shown for only one of the 4 series in h1 but show the time sensitive legend for all 4 of the series in h2?

This is what I want to show:

I attempted to do so in the legend command below but it gave me an error. Thanks again for your help.

N = 20;
x = 1:N;
y = sort(rand(N,4));
x2 = 1:N;
y2 = sort(rand(N,4));

lgd2 = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
h1 = plot(x2,y2,'k--','LineWidth',1.25,'DisplayName','Analytical'); hold on;
h2 = plot(x,y,'LineWidth',1.25);
hold off;
legend(h1(1); h2, lgd); %error here

[Walter Roberson]

N = 20;
x = 1:N;
y = sort(rand(N,4));
x2 = 1:N;
y2 = sort(rand(N,4));

lgd1 = {'Analytical'};
lgd2 = {'HGS 50-year','HGS 100-year','HGS 150-year','HGS 200-year'};
h1 = plot(x2,y2,'k--','LineWidth',1.25); hold on;
h2 = plot(x,y,'LineWidth',1.25);
hold off;
legend([h1(1); h2], [lgd1, lgd2]);

[Kien Pham]

Very elegant and without the the use of {} at all as in the solution by Star Strider. Many thanks.