MATLAB: Am I unable to see the updated serial port information in Instrument Control Toolbox 2.4 (R2006a)

availablecomInstrument Control Toolboxport

Another program outside of MATLAB (e.g., Tera Term) is using a COM port. When MATLAB starts up, I issue the following command:
instrhwinfo('serial')
ans = 
       AvailableSerialPorts: {0x1 cell}
             JarFileVersion: 'Version 2.3'
      ObjectConstructorName: {0x1 cell}
                SerialPorts: {0x1 cell}
MATLAB correctly identifies that the COM port is unavailable. However, if I disconnect from the COM port in Tera Term, and then issue the same command again in MATLAB, I get the same result as shown above. MATLAB never recognizes that the port is available during that session.

Best Answer

The ability to dynamically determine the available serial ports is not available in Instrument Control Toolbox 2.4 (R2006a). Valid ports are checked only on startup.
To work around this issue, restart MATLAB so that it recognizes that the port that was previously being used by another program is now available.
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