Editing the cell array

my cell array looks like this; %original file is also attached below.

'1.1 ECU Identification (Ford Escape Initial)'
'============================================'
'PDU    Parameter                                  Value                                      Unit'
'----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------'
'06 00  OBDMIDs                                    OBDmonitorIDsSupported$01_$1F              '
'       ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1        supported                                  '
'       ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor2        supported                                  '
'06 01  Monitor ID                                 ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1        '
'       testValue                                  0.009                                      s'
'       minimumTestLimit                           0.000                                      s'
'       maximumTestLimit                           0.400                                      s'
'       Test ID                                    0x87                                       '
'       Monitor ID                                 ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1        '
'       testValue                                  0.020                                      s'
'       minimumTestLimit                           0.000                                      s'
'       maximumTestLimit                           0.400                                      s'
'       Test ID                                    0x88                                       '
'06 02  Monitor ID                                 ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor2        '
'       testValue                                  -7876                                      mV/s'
'       minimumTestLimit                           -30000                                     mV/s'
'       maximumTestLimit                           0                                          mV/s'
'       Test ID                                    0x85                                       '
'       Monitor ID                                 ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor2        '
'       testValue                                  1.889                                      s'
'       minimumTestLimit                           0.000                                      s'
'       maximumTestLimit                           6.000                                      s'
'       Test ID                                    0x86                                       '
'06 20  OBDMIDs                                    OBDmonitorIDsSupported$21_$3F              '
'       CatalystMonitorBank1                       supported                                  '
'       VVTMonitorBank1                            supported                                  '
'       EVAPmonitorCapOff                          not supported                              '
'       EVAPmonitor_0_090                          supported                                  '
'       EVAPmonitor_0_040                          supported                                  '
'       EVAPmonitor_0_020                          supported                                  '
'       PurgeFlowMonitor                           supported                                  '
'06 21  Monitor ID                                 CatalystMonitorBank1                       '
'       testValue                                  0.062499                                   ratio'
'       minimumTestLimit                           0.000000                                   ratio'
'       maximumTestLimit                           0.761709                                   ratio'
'       Test ID                                    0x81                                       '
'06 3A  Monitor ID                                 EVAPmonitor_0_090                          '
'       testValue                                  -23.25                                     Pa'
'       minimumTestLimit                           -996.25                                    Pa'
'       maximumTestLimit                           8191.75                                    Pa'
'       Test ID                                    0x80                                       '
'       Monitor ID                                 EVAPmonitor_0_090                          '
'       testValue                                  -1992.50                                   Pa'
'       minimumTestLimit                           -8192.00                                   Pa'
'       maximumTestLimit                           -1992.50                                   Pa'
'       Test ID                                    0x82                                       '
'06 3B  Monitor ID                                 EVAPmonitor_0_040                          '

What i need to do is to rearrange it in such a way;

File          06 01                               06 01       06 01         06 01          06 01     06 02..
              Monitor ID                          testValue   minTestLimit  maxTestLimit   Test ID   ... 
Test1         ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1 0.009       0.000         0.400          0x87      ...

and so on. i think i need to loop through all the cell array to get the desired formation but i dont know how to do it. This is what i have done till now.

pwd     %identify current Folder

path=fullfile(pwd,'*.txt'); %looks for text files

dir(path) %displays the text file

path=uigetdir();   %open folder selection dialog box

A=genpath(path);   %generates path string, returns all folders and subfolders

B=strread(A,'%s','delimiter',';'); %creates cell Array

for p=1:numel(B)  %lists all the text files

      file=dir(fullfile(B{p},'*.txt'));

end

Cstr = textread('Test1.txt', '%s', 'delimiter', ''); %read file into cell array of strings

Any help in this regard is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

[yousaf obaid]

Any help in this regard will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

[Stephen23]

@yousaf obaid: presumably that data is being read from some data file. It might be easier if you edit your question and upload the file so that we can run our own code on it. This makes helping you much easier.

Probably you do not want the output to be a cell array, but some new file. Please explain a bit more what you are actually trying to achieve, because there may be easier ways to achieve it than simply "rearranging" a cell array.

[yousaf obaid]

I have uploaded the text file. please have a look at it. and what i actually want is to rearrange the cell array as shown in the question and then store the rearranged data on an Excel sheet. Now i am not certain if the output would be some new file or a new cell array but as long as it gets stored in the Excel sheet in desired format.

Answer 1

[Guillaume]

I'm sure there is a way for textscan to read your file in one go, but I always struggle to create a format string that works. Particularly, in your case your file has fixed width columns except for the last field (unit) which has varying width.

No matter, since you've already read the file let's start with your cell array. First, get rid of the headers:

%c: your cell array. I assume it's a 51x1 cell array 
c = c(5:end);

Then transform into a char array. This will ensure that all fields, including the units have the same with. char will just pad the end of each line with spaces:

c = char(c);

It's then easy to split the columns, using fixed width, and transform back into cell arrays. Note that cellstr automatically get rid of the extra spaces in each field.

%column 1 to 7 is pdu, 8 to 50 is parameter, 51 to 93 is value, 94 to end is unit
pdu = cellstr(c(:, 1:7)); 
parameter = cellstr(c(:, 8:50)); 
value = cellstr(c(:, 51:93));
unit = cellstr(c(:, 94:end));

The only thing left is to replicate the PDU for those rows where it is omitted. You could simply use a loop or:

ispresent = ~cellfun(@isempty, pdu);
pdu = repelem(pdu(ispresent), diff(find([ispresent; true])));

Your desired output is then

newc = [pdu'; parameter'; value']

[yousaf obaid]

Thanks for the answer. however, could you kindly take a look at the text file which i attached please? beccause when i run this code, some letters from the values of pdu, parameter and value are misplaced. For example, this is the cell Array for Parameter. now, the first word 'Exhaust' from the second line is missing. actually its moved to pdu coulmn. also the third column here in Parameter actually belongs to value column.

parameter
  'OBDMIDs'
  'GasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1        support'
  'GasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor2        support'
  'Monitor ID'
  'ue                                  0.009'
  'TestLimit                           0.000'
  'TestLimit                           0.400'
  '                                    0x87'
  ' ID                                 Exhaust'
  'ue                                  0.020'
  'TestLimit                           0.000'

second thing: when i run

pdu = repelem(pdu(ispresent), diff(find([ispresent; true])));

it gives me an error; Undefined function 'repelem' for input arguments of type 'cell'.

could you tell me about this also?

[yousaf obaid]

for the error, i used repmat instead of repelem and the error is gone. The output cell array is almost in the desired format. It just needs a little tweaking here and there. If you dont mind giving this thing a few more minutes i will be really thankful.

[Guillaume]

I don't know how you've generated the cell array but if I just copy the values you've put in your initial post, my code works properly. Note that I got the width of the columns from your text file and your cell array appears to be a proper match for that.

A simple way to regenerate that cell array without the headers would be:

c = strsplit(fileread('test1.txt'), {'\r', '\n'}); %read whole file in one go and split along line ends.
c = c(29:end-1); %get rid of the header and final blank line

After that my code produces the right result.

If repelem is undefined that is because you're using an older version of matlab (always a good to say so). repelem appeared in R2015a. You can replace that part with:

ispresent = ~cellfun(@isempty, pdu);
pduvalid = pdu(ispresent);
pdu = pduvalid(cumsum(ispresent))

[yousaf obaid]

You are right about using the older version of matlab. I have R2013a. The alternate that you suggested for repelem is working as well. But the desired cell array is still a little out of place here and there. Anyway I thank you for the detailed answer. It was really helpful, was totally stuck before your answer but now i can move forward on this task. Thanks once again.