Matlab execute UNIX command not working in newer versions

Question

I have a script that uses this line of code:

system(['cat ' inputfile ' | tr -d ''\000'' | tr -d ''\015'' >& tempfile.txt']);

to go through a text file and delete some special characters and then put it into a temp file.

This line of code works in Matlab2012 but not in 2017 as it leads to this error:

tr: Illegal byte sequence
cat: stdout: Broken pipe

Does anyone know how to get around this issue? Thank you!

I’m not sure, but you might need to escape the backslash. MATLAB now recognizes octal constants, this could be the reason your code no longer works. I recommend that you remove the system call and just print out the composed string you pass to it. This will give you a hint as to what is wrong. — Cris Luengo
– Cris Luengo, Commented Oct 3, 2019 at 2:09
I got no error, using 2017b on ubuntu 16.04. I tried inputfile = which('ls.m'); and the tempfile.txt was created with no error. — Yuval Harpaz
– Yuval Harpaz, Commented Oct 3, 2019 at 6:56
Maybe inputfile contains spaces? Consider enclosing it in quotes. — Bentoy13
– Bentoy13, Commented Oct 3, 2019 at 7:36

XY_N · Accepted Answer · 2020-01-09 08:35:01Z

1

system(['cat ' inputfile  ' | LC_ALL="C" tr -d ''\000''''\015'' >& tempfile.txt']);

answered Jan 9, 2020 at 8:35

XY_N

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