Saving a literal file name as a variable in Matlab - matlab

My goal is to load some files listed in the table, extract the data, and save the results as a variable of the first file name. The lists in the table are user-input characters, which represent the names of the files that will be loaded soon. I'll give you an example because you may not understand what I mean. When A,B,C (strings) are listed in the table, my code will find where they are located(eg A.txt) and load their data. After the data has been collected from them, the results are saved in the name of the table like this : A(variable)= result_data(:4). Here is my code. please let me know the wrong place. (Note that table is nx1 cell array using uitable.)
function pushbutton1_Callback(hObject, eventdata, handles)
data = get(handles.uitable,'data'); % get strings in table
for i = 1:size(data(:,1)) % count the #strings
fid = fopen([ data(i),'.csv' ]); %load the data and extract what I need
...
fclose(fid);
data(i) = result(row_1:row_2 , 4) % this is the result_data
% data(i) is variable string, so I am not sure whether to use the eval function.
end

Without having your table to debug further here is my suggestions. data is probably a cell array since you are pulling it from a uitable as below.
data = get(handles.uitable,'data'); % get strings in table
So this line should error:
fid = fopen([ data(i),'.csv' ]);
Change it to this:
fid = fopen([ data{i},'.csv' ]);
or this:
fid = fopen([ char(data(i)),'.csv' ]);
When saving your results to the variable name which matches your string I would suggesting using a structure with dynamic field names instead of a bare variable ... otherwise you will probably have to use eval which should be avoided.
So this (which isn't what you asked for):
data(i) = result(row_1:row_2 , 4) % this is the result_data
Should become:
outData.(data{i}) = result(row_1:row_2 , 4) % this is the result_data
If data is a cell array like you said containing {'A','B','C',...}
Then outData would be of the form below and contain each results.
outData.A
outData.B
outData.C

Related

Saving data to .mat file in MATLAB

I'm new to MATLAB, and I can't manage to make my function work in order to save my data into a .mat file.
The input:
A structure, with 5 fields:
data: 3D matrix of 19x1000x143
labels: 1x143 matrix with 1 or -1 in it
subject_number: an integer
sampling_rate: an integer, 500 Hz
channel_names: 1x19 matrix with text in it
name: a string for the name of the file
clean: a matrix 1x143 with 1 or 0 in it.
The idea is to save only the clean data, marked as 1 in the clean matrix.
If clean(i) is equal to 1:
save data(:,:,i) and labels(:,i)
This is the code I've tried to implement in the saving.m file:
function saving(EEG_struct, clean, name)
subject_number = EEG_struct.subject_number;
fs = EEG_struct.sampling_rate;
chan_names = EEG_struct.channel_names;
nb_epoch = size(EEG_struct.data, 3);
for j=1:nb_epoch
if clean(j) == 1
% Keep the epoch and label
data = cat(3, data, EEG_struct.data(:,:,j));
labels = cat(2, labels, EEG_struct.labels(:,j));
end
end
save(name, data, labels, subject_number, fs, chan_names)
As you can see, I would like to save the data as a structure with the same shape as the EEG_struct input.
Moreover, I would like to use a parfor instead of a for, but it raised me an error I didn't quite get:
An UndefinedFunction error was thrown on the workers for 'data'. This might be because the file containing 'data' is not accessible on the workers. Use addAttachedFiles(pool, files) to specify the required files to be attached. See the documentation for 'parallel.Pool/addAttachedFiles' for more details. Caused by: Undefined function or variable 'data'.
Thanks for the help !
You can use your clean variable as a logical index and parse out your data and labels at once. So there is no need for a loop.
Also the save command needs the "names" of the vars to save not the variables themselves. So I just put ' ' around each one.
function saving(EEG_struct, clean, name)
subject_number = EEG_struct.subject_number;
fs = EEG_struct.sampling_rate;
chan_names = EEG_struct.channel_names;
nb_epoch = size(EEG_struct.data, 3);
%No need for a loop at all
data = EEG_struct.data(:,:,logical(clean));
labels = EEG_struct.labels(logical(clean)); %This is a 1xN so I removed the extra colon operator
save(name, 'data', 'labels', 'subject_number', 'fs', 'chan_names');
EDIT:
Per you comment if you want to just leave everything in the structure. I gave you 2 options for how to save it.
function saving(EEG_struct, clean, name)
%Crop out ~clead data
EEG_struct.data = EEG_struct.data(:,:,logical(clean));
EEG_struct.labels = EEG_struct.labels(logical(clean)); %This is a 1xN so I removed the extra colon operator
% Option 1
save(name, 'EEG_struct');
% Option2
save(name, '-struct', 'EEG_struct');
Option 1 will directly save the struct to the MAT file. So if you were to load the data back like this:
test = load(name);
test =
EEG_struct: [1x1 struct]
You would get your structure placed inside another structure ... which might not be ideal or require an extra line to de-nest it. On the other hand just loading the MAT file with no outputs load(name) would put EEG_struct into your current workspace. But if in a function then it sort of springs into existence without every being declared which makes code a bit harder to follow.
Option 2 uses the '-struct' option which breaks out each field automatically into separate vars in the MAT file. So loading like this:
EEG_struct = load(name);
Will put all the fields back together again. To me at least this looks cleaner when done within a function but is probably just my preference
So comment out which ever you prefer. Also, not I did not include clean in the save. You could either append it to the MAT or add it to your structure.
To get a structure the same as EEG_struct but with only the data/labels corresponding with the clean variable, you can simply make a copy of the existing structure and remove the rows where clean=0
function saving(EEG_struct, clean, name)
newstruct = EEG_struct;
newstruct.data(:,:,logical(~clean)) = '';
newstruct.labels(logical(~clean)) = '';
save(name,'newstruct');

MATLAB: Loop through the values of a list from 'who' function

I have a long list of variables in my workspace.
First, I'm finding the potential variables I could be interested in using the who function. Next, I'd like to loop through this list to find the size of each variable, however who outputs only the name of the variables as a string.
How could I use this list to refer to the values of the variables, rather than just the name?
Thank you,
list = who('*time*')
list =
'time'
'time_1'
'time_2'
for i = 1:size(list,1);
len(i,1) = length(list(i))
end
len =
1
1
1
If you want details about the variables, you can use whos instead which will return a struct that contains (among other things) the dimensions (size) and storage size (bytes).
As far as getting the value, you could use eval but this is not recommended and you should instead consider using cell arrays or structs with dynamic field names rather than dynamic variable names.
S = whos('*time*');
for k = 1:numel(S)
disp(S(k).name)
disp(S(k).bytes)
disp(S(k).size)
% The number of elements
len(k) = prod(S(k).size);
% You CAN get the value this way (not recommended)
value = eval(S(k).name);
end
#Suever nicely explained the straightforward way to get this information. As I noted in a comment, I suggest that you take a step back, and don't generate those dynamically named variables to begin with.
You can access structs dynamically, without having to resort to the slow and unsafe eval:
timestruc.field = time;
timestruc.('field1') = time_1;
fname = 'field2';
timestruc.(fname) = time_2;
The above three assignments are all valid for a struct, and so you can address the fields of a single data struct by generating the field strings dynamically. The only constraint is that field names have to be valid variable names, so the first character of the field has to be a letter.
But here's a quick way out of the trap you got yourself into: save your workspace (well, the relevant part) in a .mat file, and read it back in. You can do this in a way that will give you a struct with fields that are exactly your variable names:
time = 1;
time_1 = 2;
time_2 = rand(4);
save('tmp.mat','time*'); % or just save('tmp.mat')
S = load('tmp.mat');
afterwards S will be a struct, each field will correspond to a variable you saved into 'tmp.mat':
>> S
S =
time: 1
time_1: 2
time_2: [4x4 double]
An example writing variables from workspace to csv files:
clear;
% Writing variables of myfile.mat to csv files
load('myfile.mat');
allvars = who;
for i=1:length(allvars)
varname = strjoin(allvars(i));
evalstr = strcat('csvwrite(', char(39), varname, '.csv', char(39), ', ', varname, ')');
eval(evalstr);
end

for loop+structure allocation in matlab

This is a problem I am working on in Matlab.
I am looping through a series of *.ALL files and stripping the field name by a delimiter '.'. The first field is the network, second station name, third location code and fourth component. I pre-allocate my structure based on the number of files (3) I run through which for this example is a 3x3x3 structure that I would like to define as struct(station,loc code,component). You can see these definitions in my code example below.
I would like to loop through the station, loc code, and component and fill their values in the structure. The only problem is for some reason the way I've defined the loop it's actually looping through the files more than once. I only want to loop through each file once and extract the station, comp, and loc code from it and put it inside the structure. Because it's looping through the files more than once it's taken like 10 minutes to fill the structure. This is not very efficient at all. Can someone point out the culprit line for me or tell me what I'm doing incorrectly?
Here's my code below:
close all;
clear;
[files]=dir('*.ALL');
for i = 1:length(files)
fields=textscan(files(i).name, '%s', 'Delimiter', '.');
net{i,1}=fields{1}{:};
sta{i,1}=fields{1}{2};
loc{i,1}=fields{1}{3};
comp{i,1}=fields{1}{4};
data = [];
halfhour(1:2) = struct('data',data);
hour(1:24) = struct('halfhour',halfhour);
day(1:366) = struct('hour',hour);
PSD_YE_DBT(1:length(files),1:length(files),1:length(files)) =
struct('sta','','loc','','comp','','allData',[],'day',day);
end
for s=1:1:length(sta)
for l=1:1:length(loc)
for c=1:1:length(comp)
tempFileName = strcat(net{s},'.',sta{s},'.',loc{l},'.',comp{c},'.','ALL');
fid = fopen(tempFileName);
PSD_YE_DBT(s,l,c).sta = sta{s};
PSD_YE_DBT(s,l,c).loc = loc{l};
PSD_YE_DBT(s,l,c).comp = comp{c};
end
end
end
Example file names for the three files I'm working with are:
XO.GRUT.--.HHE.ALL
XO.GRUT.--.HHN.ALL
XO.GRUT.--.HHZ.ALL
Thanks in advance!

Load Multiple .mat Files to Matlab workspace

I'm trying to load several .mat files to the workspace. However, they seem to overwrite each other. Instead, I want them to append. I am aware that I can do something like:
S=load(file1)
R=load(file2)
etc.
and then append the variables manually.
But there's a ton of variables, and making an append statement for each one is extremely undesirable (though possible as a last resort). Is there some way for me to load .mat files to the workspace (by using the load() command without assignment) and have them append?
Its not entirely clear what you mean by "append" but here's a way to get the data loaded into a format that should be easy to deal with:
file_list = {'file1';'file2';...};
for file = file_list'
loaded.(char(file)) = load(file);
end
This makes use of dynamic field references to load the contents of each file in the list into its own field of the loaded structure. You can iterate over the fields and manipulate the data however you'd like from here.
It sounds like you have a situation in which each file contains a matrix variable A and you want to load into memory the concatenation of all these matrices along some dimension. I had a similar need, and wrote the following function to handle it.
function var = loadCat( dim, files, varname )
%LOADCAT Concatenate variables of same name appearing in multiple MAT files
%
% where dim is dimension to concatenate along,
% files is a cell array of file names, and
% varname is a string containing the name of the desired variable
if( isempty( files ) )
var = [];
return;
end
var = load( files{1}, varname );
var = var.(varname);
for f = 2:numel(files),
newvar = load( files{f}, varname );
if( isfield( newvar, varname ) )
var = cat( dim, var, newvar.(varname) );
else
warning( 'loadCat:missingvar', [ 'File ' files{f} ' does not contain variable ' varname ] );
end
end
end
Clark's answer and function actually solved my situation perfectly... I just added the following bit of code to make it a little less tedious. Just add this to the beginning and get rid of the "files" argument:
[files,pathname] = uigetfile('*.mat', 'Select MAT files (use CTRL/COMM or SHIFT)', ...
'MultiSelect', 'on');
Alternatively, it could be even more efficient to just start with this bit:
[pathname] = uigetdir('C:\');
files = dir( fullfile(pathname,'*.mat') ); %# list all *.mat files
files = {files.name}'; %# file names
data = cell(numel(files),1); %# store file contents
for i=1:numel(files)
fname = fullfile(pathname,files{i}); %# full path to file
data{i} = load(fname); %# load file
end
(modified from process a list of files with a specific extension name in matlab).
Thanks,
Jason

How do I retrieve the names of function parameters in matlab?

Aside from parsing the function file, is there a way to get the names of the input and output arguments to a function in matlab?
For example, given the following function file:
divide.m
function [value, remain] = divide(left, right)
value = floor(left / right);
remain = left / right - value;
end
From outside the function, I want to get an array of output arguments, here: ['value', 'remain'], and similarly for the input arguments: ['left', 'right'].
Is there an easy way to do this in matlab? Matlab usually seems to support reflection pretty well.
EDIT Background:
The aim of this is to present the function parameters in a window for the user to enter. I'm writing a kind of signal processing program, and functions to perform operations on these signals are stored in a subfolder. I already have a list and the names of each function from which the user can select, but some functions require additional arguments (e.g. a smooth function might take window size as a parameter).
At the moment, I can add a new function to the subfolder which the program will find, and the user can select it to perform an operation. What I'm missing is for the user to specify the input and output parameters, and here I've hit the hurdle here in that I can't find the names of the functions.
MATLAB offers a way to get information about class metadata (using the meta package), however this is only available for OOP classes not regular functions.
One trick is to write a class definition on the fly, which contain the source of the function you would like to process, and let MATLAB deal with the parsing of the source code (which can be tricky as you'd imagine: function definition line spans multiple lines, comments before the actual definition, etc...)
So the temporary file created in your case would look like:
classdef SomeTempClassName
methods
function [value, remain] = divide(left, right)
%# ...
end
end
end
which can be then passed to meta.class.fromName to parse for metadata...
Here is a quick-and-dirty implementation of this hack:
function [inputNames,outputNames] = getArgNames(functionFile)
%# get some random file name
fname = tempname;
[~,fname] = fileparts(fname);
%# read input function content as string
str = fileread(which(functionFile));
%# build a class containing that function source, and write it to file
fid = fopen([fname '.m'], 'w');
fprintf(fid, 'classdef %s; methods;\n %s\n end; end', fname, str);
fclose(fid);
%# terminating function definition with an end statement is not
%# always required, but now becomes required with classdef
missingEndErrMsg = 'An END might be missing, possibly matching CLASSDEF.';
c = checkcode([fname '.m']); %# run mlint code analyzer on file
if ismember(missingEndErrMsg,{c.message})
% append "end" keyword to class file
str = fileread([fname '.m']);
fid = fopen([fname '.m'], 'w');
fprintf(fid, '%s \n end', str);
fclose(fid);
end
%# refresh path to force MATLAB to detect new class
rehash
%# introspection (deal with cases of nested/sub-function)
m = meta.class.fromName(fname);
idx = find(ismember({m.MethodList.Name},functionFile));
inputNames = m.MethodList(idx).InputNames;
outputNames = m.MethodList(idx).OutputNames;
%# delete temp file when done
delete([fname '.m'])
end
and simply run as:
>> [in,out] = getArgNames('divide')
in =
'left'
'right'
out =
'value'
'remain'
If your problem is limited to the simple case where you want to parse the function declaration line of a primary function in a file (i.e. you won't be dealing with local functions, nested functions, or anonymous functions), then you can extract the input and output argument names as they appear in the file using some standard string operations and regular expressions. The function declaration line has a standard format, but you have to account for a few variations due to:
Varying amounts of white space or blank lines,
The presence of single-line or block comments, and
Having the declaration broken up on more than one line.
(It turns out that accounting for a block comment was the trickiest part...)
I've put together a function get_arg_names that will handle all the above. If you give it a path to the function file, it will return two cell arrays containing your input and output parameter strings (or empty cell arrays if there are none). Note that functions with variable input or output lists will simply list 'varargin' or 'varargout', respectively, for the variable names. Here's the function:
function [inputNames, outputNames] = get_arg_names(filePath)
% Open the file:
fid = fopen(filePath);
% Skip leading comments and empty lines:
defLine = '';
while all(isspace(defLine))
defLine = strip_comments(fgets(fid));
end
% Collect all lines if the definition is on multiple lines:
index = strfind(defLine, '...');
while ~isempty(index)
defLine = [defLine(1:index-1) strip_comments(fgets(fid))];
index = strfind(defLine, '...');
end
% Close the file:
fclose(fid);
% Create the regular expression to match:
matchStr = '\s*function\s+';
if any(defLine == '=')
matchStr = strcat(matchStr, '\[?(?<outArgs>[\w, ]*)\]?\s*=\s*');
end
matchStr = strcat(matchStr, '\w+\s*\(?(?<inArgs>[\w, ]*)\)?');
% Parse the definition line (case insensitive):
argStruct = regexpi(defLine, matchStr, 'names');
% Format the input argument names:
if isfield(argStruct, 'inArgs') && ~isempty(argStruct.inArgs)
inputNames = strtrim(textscan(argStruct.inArgs, '%s', ...
'Delimiter', ','));
else
inputNames = {};
end
% Format the output argument names:
if isfield(argStruct, 'outArgs') && ~isempty(argStruct.outArgs)
outputNames = strtrim(textscan(argStruct.outArgs, '%s', ...
'Delimiter', ','));
else
outputNames = {};
end
% Nested functions:
function str = strip_comments(str)
if strcmp(strtrim(str), '%{')
strip_comment_block;
str = strip_comments(fgets(fid));
else
str = strtok([' ' str], '%');
end
end
function strip_comment_block
str = strtrim(fgets(fid));
while ~strcmp(str, '%}')
if strcmp(str, '%{')
strip_comment_block;
end
str = strtrim(fgets(fid));
end
end
end
This is going to be very hard (read: impossible) to do for general functions (think of things like varargin, etc). Also, in general, relying on variable names as a form of documentation might be... not what you want. I'm going to suggest a different approach.
Since you control the program, what about specifying each module not just with the m-file, but also with a table entry with extra information. You could document the extra parameters, the function itself, notate when options are booleans and present them as checkboxes, etc.
Now, where to put this? I would suggest to have the main m-file function return the structure, as sort of a module loading step, with a function handle that points to the subfunction (or nested function) that does the real work. This preserves the single-file setup that I'm sure you want to keep, and makes for a much more configurable setup for your modules.
function module = divide_load()
module.fn = #my_divide;
module.name = 'Divide';
module.description = 'Divide two signals';
module.param(1).name = 'left';
module.param(1).description = 'left signal';
module.param(1).required_shape = 'columnvector';
% Etc, etc.
function [value, remain] = my_divide(left, right)
value = floor(left / right);
remain = left / right - value;
end
end
When you can't get information from a programming langauge about its contents (e.g., "reflection"), you have to step outside the language.
Another poster suggested "regular expressions", which always fail when applied to parsing real programs because regexps cannot parse context free langauges.
To do this reliably, you need a real M language parser, that will give you access to the parse tree. Then this is fairly easy.
Our DMS Software Reengineering Toolkit has an M language parser available for it, and could do this.
Have you considered using map containers?
You can write your functions along these lines . . .
function [outMAP] = divide(inMAP)
outMAP = containers.Map();
outMAP('value') = floor(inMAP('left') / inMAP('right'));
outMAP('remain') = inMAP('left') / inMAP('right') - outMAP('value');
end
...and call them like this ...
inMAP = containers.Map({'left', 'right'}, {4, 5});
outMAP = divide(inMAP);
...and then simply examine tha variable names using the following syntax...
>> keys(inMAP)
ans =
'left' 'right'
inputname(argnum) http://www.mathworks.com/help/techdoc/ref/inputname.html .