textscan question skip lines

I'm using textscan to import a non rectangular data text file. I'm having an issue skipping lines. The file has 10 rows at the begining which I'd like to skip, and for that I use the HeaderLines option.

fid = fopen('test.txt');

c = textscan(fid,'%s%d %d %d %d %d %d','HeaderLines', 10 );

fclose(fid);

The rest of the text file periodically, every 50 lines has a few lines that I'd also like to skip, this is where I'm running into a problem. Any ideas?

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

When you textscan, add a count after the format. The count will be the number of times the format is re-applied, and thus limits the number of lines read with that textscan() call. You would then loop around doing such calls and splicing the data together.

In some cases you can make use of the CommentStyle parameter to cause textscan() to automatically skip parts of the input. For example, if each of the lines to be skipped started with ';' you could set CommentStyle to ';' and the lines would be skipped. If this case applies to you, you would not need to put a count on or splice the data together.

[Harishkumar Gajakosh]

Lets suppose a case where i need to skip the lines starting from '%'. Then, How do we do that? I tried to do the following.

data = textscan(simID,'N%d G%d X%f Y%f Z%f','Delimiter',' ','CommentStyle','(','% ');

But when i run it i get the error as

Error using textscan
Name-value pair arguments must come in pairs.

Error in TootPath_Simulator (line 2)
data = textscan(simID,'N%d G%d X%f Y%f Z%f','Delimiter',' ','CommentStyle','(','% ');

[Stephen23]

@Harishkumar Gajakosh:

'CommentStyle',{'(','% '})
%              ^        ^

[Harishkumar Gajakosh]

@Stephen: I think that if i were to use this then it would read everything between '(' and '%' as comment i.e the comment starts at '(' and ends at '%', based on the reference given here, under 'CommentStyle — Symbols designating text to ignore' section.

Thus, it is not helping. I appreciate the effort though. Thanks.

Answer 2

[per isakson]

See my answer http://www.mathworks.se/matlabcentral/answers/58463-read-data-form-file and the answer that I link to.