Reading a Text File

Hi,

I'm a bit lost with Input/Output and text files on MATLAB. If I'm given a text file containing a list of names and telephone numbers e.g.

John Smith 415 278 9082 

Gabriel Zoro 214 678 0929

How can I create a function to search for a someone's first and last name and then display the line with the phone number?

Thank you!!

[Walter Roberson]

What do you know about the format of the file? Will each line always have exactly two names, separated by spaces? No "Dr", no middle names, no "Sr", no "von"?

Will each line always have exactly three portions of the phone number, separated by spaces? Does the phone number ever include '+' or '-' or '(' and ')' ?

[Bridgit Nata]

Each Line will have exactly two names separated by space - No "dr" middle names, titles etc.

The phone numbers doesn't always have three portions. But it always have a bracketed portion for the first part and separated by spaces between the portions. Some are like:

[phone]

[phone]

(011033-1) 3482152

(011-81-3) 34561212

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

searchfor = input('Name to look for?', 's');

fid = fopen('YourFile.txt', 'r');
matches = 0;
while true
  thisline = fgetl(fid);
  if ~ischar(thisline)
    break;  %end of file
  end
  if isempty( strtrim(thisline) )
    continue;  %just whitespace on this line
  end
  if strncmp( lower(thisline), lower(searchfor), length(searchfor))
    matches = matches + 1;
    fprintf('Match: %s\n', thisline);
  end
end
if matches == 0
  fprintf('No matches for "%s"\n', searchfor)
end