Convert cell array with characters to vector with numbers?

Hi guys,

I've been trying to get a cell array that looks like this:

y = 

    'a'
    'a'
    'a'
    'b'
    'b'
    'a'
    'a'
    'b'
    'a'
    'b'
    'b'
    'b'

to convert it to a vector that looks like this: y =

    1
    1
    1
    0
    0
    1
    1
    0
    1
    0
    0
    0

How do I do this? I've been trying to get it right with strfind and using it on the cell array and use those results to alter the contents of the cell array before I convert it to a vector with cell2mat().

But no luck so far.

Can someone help me with this?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

ismember(y, 'a')

[the cyclist]

If your array "y" is large, or you do this operation many times, you might want to do some timing experiments. On my machine, ismember() takes about 10 times longer than strcmp() to do this operation on moderately large arrays.

Answer 2

[the cyclist]

One of many ways:

strcmp(y,'a')

[Jan]

I prefer this, because it is lean and fast for small and large input.

Answer 3

[Andrei Bobrov]

50 - (char(y)-'0')

[Walter Roberson]

'b' - char(y)