MATLAB: Get a file path

folderget pathpath

Hello

I'm from Chile and a Matlab noob. I'm triying to work with files and folders. I have to search a folder in the current directory by a part of its name. The part of its name is saved inside a cell array. Then I have to save the folder's path. I don't know if there is a command to do this, I only know uigetdir, and its useless because you have to search the folder on the window.

Regards and apologizes about my english writing

Best Answer

partial_names = {'_MX3', '_NY2'};   %for example
dir_to_search = pwd;   %current directory
which_one = randi(length(partial_names));
dinfo = dir( fullfile(dir_to_search, ['*', partial_names{which_one}, '*']);
dinfo( ~[dinfo.isdir] ) = [];      %you are only interested in folders
if isempty(dinfo)
    disp('No matches')
    folder_names = {};
else
    folder_names = fullfile( {dinfo.folder}, {dinfo.name} );
end

Now folder_names should be a cell array of fully-qualified folder names whose last component matches the partial name.

Note: in some cases the folder name might be a "canonical name" rather than the name you cd'd to. This can occur if you are using symbolic links or hard links so that there are multiple valid names to reach the same location.

Note: this requires R2016b or later. In earlier versions, getting the canonical name of a folder can be more difficult.

Related Solutions

MATLAB: List all and only files with no extension

Folder   = 'C:\Temp';  % Your folder
FileList = dir(fullfile(Folder, '*'));
NameList = {FileList.name};
% NameList(ismember(NameList, {'.', '..'})) = [];  % Remove . and ..  Not required here
hasDot   = contains(NameList, '.');
NameList(hasDot) = [];   % Removes . and .. also

Now this is the list of all files, which do not contain a dot and there do not have a file extension. If you want to exclude folders also:

NameList(hasDot || [Filelist.isdir]) = [];

If you want to search recursively in subfolders also:

FileList = dir(fullfile(Folder, '**', '*'));
isFile   = [FileList.isdir];
NameList = {FileList(isFile).name};
PathList = {FileList(isFile).folder};
noDot    = ~contains(NameList, '.');
File     = fullfile(PathList(noDot), NameList(noDot));

MATLAB: How to read all text files in a folder without making a struct

x = dir ('*.txt') does return a struct but it is a struct of information about the files, not a struct of the data. It basically tells you want the names of the files are (and sizes and last modified and things like that.) You still need to do the loading.

For example,

dinfo = dir('*.txt');
for K = 1 : length(dinfo)
  thisfilename = dinfo(K).name;  %just the name
  thisdata = load(thisfilename); %load just this file

  fprintf( 'File #%d, "%s", maximum value was: %g\n', K, thisfilename, max(thisdata(:)) );   %do something with the data

end

If you already know the names then you don't need to use dir() to tell them to you. For example,

for K = 1 : 42
  thisfilename = sprintf('qwerty_%04d.txt', K);
  thisdata = load(thisfilename); %load just this file
  fprintf( 'File #%d, "%s", maximum value was: %g\n', K, thisfilename, max(thisdata(:)) );   %do something with the data
end

to load qwerty_0001.txt, qwerty_0002.txt ... qwerty_0042.txt

Best Answer

Related Solutions

MATLAB: List all and only files with no extension

MATLAB: How to read all text files in a folder without making a struct

Related Question