Why does CD-ing into a directory with a large number of files slow down MATLAB 8.0 R2012b on Linux?

I have a directory that contains a large number of my files (size ~ 75GB).

When I CD into this folder, MATLAB does not respond for as long as 6 minutes. How do I reduce this delay? I am using a Linux machine.

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

Currently the only way to work around this is to use the -nodesktop option while starting MATLAB.

Apart from this, there are no other workarounds.

[Walter Roberson]

Does this apply to all operating systems?

[Walter Roberson]

When you cd into a directory, matlab needs to examine all of the file names to see if there are any m or p or mlx or slx or mlapp or mex* files (and so on) as the executables in a directory become part of the matlab path, potentially requiring a change in execution path.

You should avoid cd in programs .