MATLAB: How to specify the location of a UIGETFILE box on a Windows machine

MATLABuiputfile

To open the file-selection dialog box, I use the UIGETFILE function. The documentation states that the following line of code:

uigetfile('Location',[x y])

opens a dialog box at position [x,y], where x and y are the distances in pixel units from the left and top edges of the screen. The Location property-value pair is currently supported only on UNIX platforms.

The same holds true for the UIPUTFILE function. I am using MATLAB on Windows and I would like to position the dialog box somewhere other than the top-left corner of the screen.

Best Answer

The ability to specify a Location property-value pair in a UIGETFILE or UIPUTFILE command is not available when running MATLAB in Windows.

To work around this issue, you will need to use a list-selection dialog box to select a file. The LISTDLG function opens a dialog in the center of the screen (rather than the top-left corner).

To see how to populate a list-selection dialog with the contents of a directory, refer to the example at the bottom of the LISTDLG documentation.

Related Solutions

MATLAB: How to specify the directory path when I use the UIGETFILE or UIPUTFILE functions in MATLAB 6.5 (R13)

It is possible to specify the path to the directory you would like the UIGETFILE or UIPUTFILE functions to begin in, by specifying the path in the FilterSpec input argument. To do this, use the full path to the directory.

Under Macintosh OS X and UNIX, '~' is allowed as a directory specification (current user's home directory). The following example code will list files with a .M extension in the "matlab" subdirectory.

[FileName,PathName] = uigetfile('~/matlab/*.m', 'MATLAB program files')

Note that you cannot use '.' or '..' or directory specifications such as "matlab/*.m", because the

notion of the 'current directory' is not preserved between calls to UIGETFILE or UIPUTFILE.

Care must be taken when specifying more than one file type and their respective description through the use of the cell array notation that is described in the documentation. When using the cell array notation, the path name must be included after the DialogTitle input argument. The following code is an example of how to accomplish this task under the UNIX system:

[FileName,PathName] = uigetfile({'*.dat;*.csv','Data Files (*.dat,*.csv)';'*.*','All Files (*.*)'}, ...
'Pick Another File','/home/');

In this example, the UIGETFILE dialog box with the title, "Pick Another File", will begin in the "home" directory and will list the *.dat and *.csv files.

Under Windows, you can specify the directory in the same manner as described above except using the DOS directory structure notation. The following code is an example of using two calls to UIGETFILE. The first call starts UIGETFILE in the current working directory and lets the user search for a desired file. The second call allows the user to begin in the desired directory that was chosen from the first call.

[FileName,PathName] = uigetfile({'*.dat;*.csv','Data Files (*.dat,*.csv)';'*.*','All Files (*.*)'}, ...
'Pick a File');
[FileName,PathName] = uigetfile({'*.dat;*.csv','Data Files (*.dat,*.csv)';'*.*','All Files (*.*)'}, ...
'Pick Another File',PathName);

The following code is an example of specifying the directory path without using the cell array format.

[FileName PathName] = uigetfile('D:\Applications\Matlab6p5\work\*.m;*.mdl;*.mat','MATLAB Files');

Note that all the above examples behave the same for UIPUTFILE as well.

MATLAB: How to prevent user from changing directory using uiputfile

Sure, just ignore what folder they pick.

% Get the name of the file that the user wants to save.
startingFolder = 'c:\'; % Whatever folder you want
defaultFileName = fullfile(startingFolder, '*.*');
[baseFileName, folder] = uiputfile(defaultFileName, 'Just try to specify a file in a different folder - I dare you')
if baseFileName == 0
  % User clicked the Cancel button.
  return;
end
% Create filename using your folder, not theirs.
fullFileName = fullfile(startingFolder, baseFileName);
message = sprintf('I will save your file as:\n%s', fullFileName)
msgbox(message);

Or you could just have an edit field where they type in the filename and you use fullfile() like I did above. Why even have them use uiputfile at all?

Best Answer

Related Solutions

MATLAB: How to specify the directory path when I use the UIGETFILE or UIPUTFILE functions in MATLAB 6.5 (R13)

MATLAB: How to prevent user from changing directory using uiputfile

Related Question