How to read date and time from text file and move into cell array?

hello. i have a text file which contains a date and a time. I need to extract the date and time from the text file and put it in the cell array. The cell array should look like this:

 Date        Time      06 00                          06 00 
                       OBDMIDs                        ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1
 2016-03-18  09:21:31  OBDmonitorIDsSupported$01_$1F  Supported

Please note that nothing needs to be done for rest of the columns. Its already done.

this is my code;

Cstr = textread('Test1.txt', '%s', 'delimiter', ''); 
 cString = Cstr(29:end); %removes headers
 cString = char(cString);   %Transforms into a char array,...

%split the columns
pdu = cellstr(cString(:, 1)); 
parameter = cellstr(cString(:, 1:42)); 
value = cellstr(cString(:, 43:86));  
%unit = cellstr(cString(:, 87:end));  

for i=1:length(parameter)
    temp = parameter{i};
    if ismember(temp(1),num2str(0:9))
        tempSplit = regexp(temp,'  ', 'split');
        newPDU(i) = tempSplit(1);
        newParameter(i) = tempSplit(2);
    else
        newPDU(i) = newPDU(i-1);
        newParameter(i) = parameter(i);
    end
end

newc = [newPDU; newParameter; value'];

the text file is attached below. Thank you for the help in advance.

Answer 1

[Shameer Parmar]

% code for Date
Date = Cstr{3};
splitDate = strtrim(regexp(Cstr{3},' ','split'));
newDate{1} = strrep(splitDate{1},':','');
newDate{2} = '';
newDate{3} = splitDate{end};
newDate'

.

 % code for Time
Time = Cstr{4};
splitTime = strtrim(regexp(Cstr{4},' ','split'));
newTime{1} = strrep(splitTime{1},':','');
newTime{2} = '';
newTime{3} = splitTime{end};
newTime'

once done, please concatenate with newc as follow..

 final_newc = [newDate', newTime', newc];

[yousaf obaid]

Brilliant. Works again without any problem. Now just one question remaining. will post a new question. Thank you once again.

[Guillaume]

I'd recommend (to both Shameer and yousaf) learning regular expressions properly. It is a complete waste of time to strtrim and strrep, the result of a regexp. regexp can do it all at once:

result = regexp(line, '(\S+)\s*:\s*(\S+)', 'tokens', 'once');

is one of the many ways of doing the same as above in just one line.

Answer 2

[Guillaume]

Before you remove the headers obviously:

date = regexp(Cstr{4}, '(?<=Date:\s*)\S+', 'match', 'once');
time = regexp(Cstr{5}, '(?<=Time:\s*)\S+', 'match', 'once');

At the end:

newc = [{'Date', 'Time'; '', ''; date, time}, newc];

I see you've given up on my previous solution for reading your file, which is a shame as it avoided loops entirely.

[yousaf obaid]

@Guillaume! i did not give up on your solution at all. this is just an extension work of what i asked before and for which you gave the perfect answer. please just have a look at the code again. i am totally new to matlab but i think this new code is using your technique entirely.

[Guillaume]

Well, you're parsing the PDU very differently and as a result requires even more parsing. You went from a clean and efficient (in my opinion) solution to one that includes an extra loop for more parsing and, if you use the overly complicated answer you've accepted here, even more parsing!

You're parsing the same data three times now. In the grand scheme of things it probably does not matter as your text file is fairly small so you won't notice the extra time spent reparsing the data.

I would recommend adding comments to questions if the solution does not work perfectly rather than asking new question. It makes it easier to follow what you're doing.

Also, I'd recommend waiting a little before accepting answers.

[yousaf obaid]

the reason for parsing the PDU differently is because the output from your answer was like this

06 00 OBDMIDs                        Exhaust                                 
      OBDmonitorIDsSupported$01_$1F  GasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1 supported

While i wanted it to be like this

06 00                          06 00
OBDMIDs                        ExhaustGasSensorMonitorBank1Sensor1
OBDmonitorIDsSupported$01_$1F  supported

and so on. there were other instances of misplaced words as well for example 'TestValue' was displayed as 'testval' in one row and 'ue' in the next row. this was the only reason that i posted a new question.

and thank you for your last advice. I will definitely keep that in my mind for my further questions. Thank you.