Has xlsread been made compatible on Mac yet?

I saw in a previously asked question from a few years ago that the function xlsread() does not work on Mac. See http://www.mathworks.com/support/solutions/en/data/1-2SJUON/index.html. Since then, has the feature been added or does it still revert to csvread()? I need to read in an excel file that has numeric and text values, and csvread won't suffice for that job.

[Mack Gardner-Morse]

Also will not read sheet names. Only the sheet number.

[Michel Georges Decker]

In 2020b it reads the sheet names completely fine. (also works with Apple Silicon M1)

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

Support for .xls files was added a couple of years ago, but the exact version number does not come to mind.

If you are using R2013b or later, especially R2014b or later, then I suggest you consider using readtable()

Documentation for xlsread('basic')

basic mode is the default for computers without Excel for Windows. In basic mode, xlsread:

• Reads XLS, XLSX, XLSM, XLTX, and XLTM files only.
• Does not support an xlRange input when reading XLS files. In this case, use '' in place of xlRange.
• Does not support function handle inputs.
• Imports all dates as Excel serial date numbers. Excel serial date numbers use a different reference date than MATLAB® date numbers.

[POV G]

"Imports all dates as Excel serial date numbers. Excel serial date numbers use a different reference date than MATLAB® date numbers." - so how to overcome this problem when importing excel files with dates and numbers in one?

Thank you in advance Paul