How can I import, extract, and average certain data from a excel/csv file?

I have a large number of files that look like the csv file that is attached attached.

In this file there are distinct 'blocks' wherein the data was logged to the computer. I need to find a way to subtract each'S' value (which represents seconds of the experiment) from the previous so I can measure how long on average there was between each data point. I also need the averaged S values to be sorted into two categories: one in which 'Q' is greater than or equal to 1 and the other in which Q was = to 0.

I'm extremely new to matlab as well as coding in general and I am unsure of where to begin. If you can help me get started I would really appreciate it.

Thank you!

Answer 1

[Renato Agurto]

This should get 2 arrays (S_vals, Q_vals) for the values of S and Q in the file and help as a start point. If you need more help in the operations you want to do, just ask

 %Read file
 [~,~,raw] = xlsread('Baseline Day 4 112915.csv');

 %filter lines that starts with "S:" and "Q:"
 S_lines = raw(strncmp('S:', raw,2));
 Q_lines = raw(strncmp('Q:', raw,2));

 %get values and transform to numbers
 tmp = cellfun(@(x) str2double(x(3:end)), S_lines,'UniformOutput', false);
 S_vals = cell2mat(tmp);

 tmp = cellfun(@(x) str2double(x(3:end)), Q_lines,'UniformOutput', false);
 Q_vals = cell2mat(tmp);

other commands you may find helpful:

 S_Q_0 = S_vals(Q_vals == 0)) %Svalues where Q equals 0
 S_Q_1 = S_vals(Q_vals >= 0)) %Svalues where Q equals 1 or greater
 S_diff = S_vals - [0;S_vals(1:end-1)]; %difference to previous S values

[Katherine]

Thank you! This was a huge help