I'm not sure exactly what you're after. Here are some possibilities
>> format short
>> disp(AB)
0 1.0000 1.0000
1.4142 2.0000 0
0 1.0000 1.0000
>> format long
>> disp(AB)
0 1.000000000000000 1.000000000000000
1.414213562373095 2.000000000000000 0
0 1.000000000000000 1.000000000000000
>> format shortg
>> disp(AB)
0 1 1
1.4142 2 0
0 1 1
>> format longg
>> disp(AB)
0 1 1
1.4142135623731 2 0
0 1 1
If you're saying you want it to literally say "sqrt(2)", then you can't do that using numeric arrays. As soon as you set an element of a numeric array equal to sqrt(2), MATLAB forgets how it arrived at that value, and only remembers the floating-point approximation. The only option I can see would be to use the Symbolic Toolbox:
>> AB = sym([0 1 1; sqrt(sym(2)) 2 0; 0 1 1]);
>> disp("AB: "); disp(AB)
AB:
[ 0, 1, 1]
[ 2^(1/2), 2, 0]
[ 0, 1, 1]
You can then convert this to a numeric array any time using eval:
>> eval(AB)
ans =
0 1 1
1.4142 2 0
0 1 1
