How to import a 50mb csv file?

I have a csv file of size 50mb. The data is numbers and strings. I tried to import it using the import button in matlab. Now the data is 100% parsed but nothing happens for an hour, I think it's still working. It took more than 6 hours to parse 100%. Is there a smarter and faster way to import the data and save it as a matrix?

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

We recommend using readtable(). Especially if you have R2016b or later, in which case use detectImportOptions first to create an options structure to pass to readtable() .

[Stef]

Thank you, readtable works. But I need to end up with a matrix, but table2array does not work. Do you have an idea how to solve that?

[Walter Roberson]

If you need to end up with a matrix, then table2cell() . You cannot use table2array() because you have mixed data types.

If you want to create arrays of the various parts that are alike, then

raw = table2cell(YourTable);
mask = cellfun(@isnumeric, raw(1,:));
num = cell2mat( raw(:,mask) );

mask = cellfun(@ischar, raw(1,:));
txt = raw(:,mask);

Here I make the assumption that all entries in a column are the same data type. This will not necessarily be true if you used readtable() with empty cells or text-based indicators of missing data such as "NA" that do not happen to match "nan" or "NaN" -- though if you used detectImportOptions then it should notice those by itself, and you can also use the TreatAsEmpty option to readtable.