MATLAB: Read multiple txt files using a loop

dlmreadmultipletext filetxt

This is the following code that i have
EDIdir = 'C:\Users\Alexis\Google Drive\B\D\';
date_1 = 2016-06-10
date_2 = 2016-06-11
Qdata = dlmread([EDIdir 'Something_' date_1 '.txt']);
I want to process multiple data from different dates, eg have date_2, date_3, date_4… Tried using a for loop to loop through date_i, i = 1:12 but didn't work. I am sure that i am making some kind of syntax wrong.
Thank you.

Best Answer

Your mistake was to create lots of individual numbered variables for the date strings. This is a very bad idea, because it makes accessing them very difficult (read this page to know why). Instead, put all of your dates into one array (e.g. a cell array) and looping over it becomes trivial using basic indexing:
dates = {'2016-06-10','2016-06-11'};
out = cell(size(dates));
for k = 1:numel(dates)
    fname = sprintf('Something_%s.txt',dates{k})
    out{k} = dlmread(fullfile(EDIdir,fname));
end
Or alternatively you might like to use the dir method:
 S = dir(fullfile(EDIdir,'Something_*.txt'));
 out = cell(size(S));
 for k = 1:numel(S)
     fname = S(k).name;
     etc
 end
You will find a detailed explanation of both methods here:
http://matlab.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ#How_can_I_process_a_sequence_of_files.3F
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