Plotting large amounts of txt files then exporting results

I am not adept at MATLAB, but I would like help in plotting data from several hundred .txt files and saving the plot results as a .tif or other easily readable file.

How do I import data from such a large amount of files, that share an identical layout, but may have a different amount of rows, then have each txt file plotted and exported as a readable file or pic? I want to save myself having to spend a lot of time doing each txt file individually.

Answer 1

[Geoff]

You want to start with the dir command to find the contents of a directory.

indir = 'mydatadir\';  % or / if you are not using windows.
outdir = indir;

mkdir(outdir);         % Ensure output dir exists

f = dir([indir '*.txt']);

for n = 1:numel(f)

    basename = f(n).name(1:end-4);  % remove .txt
    infile = [indir f(n).name]
    outfile = [outdir basename '.tiff'];

    % now load the file and plot your chart as you would normally
    %[TODO]

    % save the chart (in this case it's gcf, but could be your own figure
    print( gcf, '-dtiff', outfile );

end

This will output an image for each file, using the same base filename: ie data03.txt --> data03.tiff

Look at the documentation for print. I used -dtiff, but you could spit out a jpeg, png, or eps instead.

You'll probably want to change various parameters on your figures to set the size. Play around, and enjoy.