How to select variable based on numbers in variable name?

I have variables named as X1, X2, X3,...,X72. Is there a way to place them in a vector based on the number in the variable name? For example, suppose I want to put the multiples of 5 in a vector: vec=[X5 X10 X15...X70]. However, I want the value assigned to the variable and not the variable name to be displayed.

[Robert Cumming]

can you show some of your code to get a better idea of what you are doing?

Answer 1

[Sean de Wolski]

http://matlab.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ#How_can_I_create_variables_A1.2C_A2.2C....2CA10_in_a_loop.3F

and

http://matlab.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ#How_can_I_process_a_sequence_of_files.3F

Answer 2

[Jason Ross]

Do you need to create all these variables with the names, or you could you make an array called X and then use the index?

X = [10 20 30 40 50]
vec = [X(1) X(3)]

Otherwise, it sounds like you are going to be reinventing a lot of stuff that is already implemented.

[Laura]

I am uploading a series of 72 .dat files into Matlab. Each of these files has a single number, which Matlab assigns the variable names X1,X2,...

So I think I am stuck with using all the variables.

[Jason Ross]

What method are you using to actually get the data in?

[Laura]

files = dir('*.dat');

[Jason Ross]

So that will give you a list of the .dat files in the directory. I'm assuming there is some code that actually opens the filename and then reads the content of the file (which I understand to be a single number).

e.g.

example1.dat contains "12345"

example2.dat contains "678910"

and so on for 72 times.