Create string from a cell array

Hi,

I have a list of names in a 1 by n matrix. I would like to make them into one string (to generate file names, the end result of my program saves a graph to a file). The names are from varargin (which allows variable amount of inputs)

names=varargin;

I have tried using:

char(names)

This does give a character result, but over n rows. I want one string. Ideally, I would be able to seperate names with underscores, but I would settle for just a string (no spaces) of the names.

Any help would be great.

[Andrew Newell]

Don't forget to indent your code two spaces (see http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/7885-tutorial-how-to-format-your-question).

Answer 1

[Jan]

Simple and fast:

Str = sprintf('%s_', varargin{:});
Str(end) = [];

But if the cell string has a lot of elements, this can be imrpoved: Obviously SPRINTF does not preallocate the complete string at first. Then try: FEX: CStr2String.

[daniel.x16]

Perfect! Thanks so much!

Answer 2

[Walter Roberson]

cell2mat(strcat(varargin,'_'))

You can then delete the trailing _ from that if you like.

Answer 3

[Andrew Newell]

If you want to be sure that there are no whitespace characters, you could use this:

regexprep([names{:}],'\s+','_')

e.g.,

names = {'Cup   ',' a ','Joe'}

gives

Cup_a_Joe

Of course, you will get surprises if there is a blank in the middle of one of your arguments!