How can I format unknown filename with urlread?

Hi all.

I must retrieve .txt file from a url like this:

http://vadar.wishartlab.com/tmp/vadar_1366196244_m0.stats.txt

but I don't succeed in using urlread, because the number between 'vadar_' and '_m0' is generating in real time (after a cgi query reported on web toolbar). How can I use a format mode for any unknown number in urlread?

Regards.

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

If you are getting it from a query then you can probably get it as a string. Then you can form the URL name as

['http://vadar.wishartlab.com/tmp/vadar_' NUMBERSTRING '_m0.stats.txt']

[Geggio®]

The problem is that at the beginning NUMBERSTRING is unknown (a temp id number), it's generating in real time: in the query I use other parameters. How can replace NUMBERSTRING with something like %... (sscanf) or regexp without having knowledge of it?

Regards.

[Walter Roberson]

For example,

str = '<QueryID = "1366196244">';
NUMBERSTRING = regexp(str, '\d+', 'match');
url = ['http://vadar.wishartlab.com/tmp/vadar_' NUMBERSTRING '_m0.stats.txt'];
urlread(url)

[Geggio®]

I'd like this solution, but QueryID isn't known: it's generating from a web server program and I would retrive relative url with NUMBERSTRING. I post some code rows:

url = 'http://vadar.wishartlab.com/cgi-bin/vadarmulti.cgi?pdbid=4HHBA&statsinfo=1';
[stat, h1] = web(url);

First row is the query, then I open Matlab web browser, that generates a new urlread without the NUMBERSTRING. NUMBERSTRING is in a other window ('STATISTICS' on site), with a url

'http://vadar.wishartlab.com/tmp/vadar_'NUMBERSTRING'_m0.stats.txt'

that I can't retrieve without knowing it. (NUMBERSTRING is in the cgi source code...) It seems a maze, but I know it's my fault!

Regards.

[Walter Roberson]

The HTML generated by the site includes

<A HREF=/tmp/vadar_1366211367_m0.stats.txt target=_blank>Statistics</A>

You can parse this out of the string "stat" using regexp

relurl = regexp( stat, '(?<=HREF=)(\S+)(?=\s\S+Statistics)', 'match');
url = [ 'http://vadar.wishartlab.com' relurl{1} ];
urlread(url)