Convert dates from Excel to Matlab

Question

I have a series of dates and some corresponding values. The format of the data in Excel is \"Custom\" dd/mm/yyyy hh:mm. When I try to convert this column into a

Answer 1

According to the documentation of datestr the syntax for minutes, months and hours is as follows:

HH -> Hour in two digits
MM -> Minute in two digits
mm -> Month in two digits

Therefore you have to change the syntax in the call for datestr. Because the serial date number format between Excel and Matlab differ, you have to add an offset of 693960 to the retrieved numbers from xlsread.

dateval    = xlsread('test.xls',1,'A:A') + 693960;
datestring = datestr(dateval, 'dd/mm/yyyy HH:MM');

This will read the first column (A) of the first sheet (1) in the Excel-file. For better performance you can specify the range explicitly (for example 'A1:A20').

The code converts...

... to:

datestring =
22/06/2015 16:00

Edit: The following code should work for your provided Excel-file:

% read from file
tbl = readtable('data.xls','ReadVariableNames',false);
dateval = tbl.(1);
dateval = dateval + 693960;
datestring = datestr(dateval)

% plot with dateticks as x-axis
plot(dateval,tbl.(2))
datetick('x','mmm/yy')
%datetick('x','dd/mmm/yy')  % this is maybe better than only the months