MATLAB: Replacing a string

Question

I have a set of strings is it possible to replace it by values

for example in excel if i have strings as

private public employed unemployed

is it possible to replace values by 0.1,0.2,0.3,0.4

Answer 1

[num, txt]=xlsread('Book1.xls');
txt=strrep(txt,'private','0.1');
txt=strrep(txt,'public','0.2');
txt=strrep(txt,'unemployed','0.4');
txt=strrep(txt,'employed','0.3');
Val = str2double(txt);