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Write to a Diary File

To keep an activity log of your MATLAB® session, use the diary function. diary creates a verbatim copy of your MATLAB session in a disk file (excluding graphics).

For example, if you have the array A in your workspace,

A = [ 1 2 3 4; 5 6 7 8 ];

execute these commands at the MATLAB prompt to export this array using diary:

  1. Turn on the diary function. Optionally, you can name the output file diary creates:

    diary my_data.out
    
  2. Display the contents of the array you want to export. This example displays the array A. You could also display a cell array or other MATLAB class:

    A =
        1     2     3     4
        5     6     7     8
    
  3. Turn off the diary function:

    diary off
    

    diary creates the file my_data.out and records all the commands executed in the MATLAB session until you turn it off:

    A =
    
         1     2     3     4
         5     6     7     8
    
    diary off
    
  4. Open the diary file my_data.out in a text editor and remove the extraneous text, if desired.