immediate refresh function for cd?

When I run this code in a script:

cd(my_folder_name)
% what goes here?
pause(15)

the current folder window doesn't update until after the script finishes. Is there a command that could go between the cd and the pause so that the current folder window would show the new folder immediately, without waiting for the script to finish?

Thanks,

Answer 1

[Paras Gupta]

Hi Jeff,

I understand that you want to update the current folder window in MATLAB as soon as the cd function is executed in the script above.

Even though the cd function immediately changes the current directory, the current folder window is updated only after the script finishes executing. There is no direct command within MATLAB to achieve this functionality as the current folder window is managed by the operating system's file explorer.

However, you can try a workaround using the winopen function in MATLAB for Windows operating systems. This function opens a specified folder in a new file explorer window. Here's an example of how you can modify your script:

cd('my_folder_name') 
winopen(pwd) 
pause(15) 

You can also use the system command in MATLAB to execute platform-specific commands for different operating systems. Here's an example that should work across different operating systems:

cd('my_folder_name') 
if ispc 
    system('explorer .'); 
elseif isunix 
    system('xdg-open .'); 
elseif ismac 
    system('open .'); 
end 
pause(15) 

You can refer to the following documents for more information on the functions above:

• https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/winopen.html
• https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/system.html

Hope it helps.

[Jeff Miller]

@Paras Gupta Thanks for the suggestion, but in my situation winopen and system are awkward because the script works through a number of folders. Opening another explorer window for each new folder leaves the screen unnecessarily cluttered, and closing each explorer window when I'm done with it is a bit complicated and unreliable (see this question). I was hoping there would be something like 'drawnow' that would work to update MATLAB's own folder window...