FreeMat
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Section: Operating System Functions
Changes the current working directory to the one specified as the argument. The general syntax for its use is
cd('dirname')
but this can also be expressed as
cd 'dirname'
or
cd dirname
Examples of all three usages are given below. Generally speaking, dirname
is any string that would be accepted by the underlying OS as a valid directory name. For example, on most systems, '.'
refers to the current directory, and '..'
refers to the parent directory. Also, depending on the OS, it may be necessary to ``escape'' the directory seperators. In particular, if directories are seperated with the backwards-slash character '\'
, then the path specification must use double-slashes '\\'
. Note: to get file-name completion to work at this time, you must use one of the first two forms of the command.
The pwd
command returns the current directory location. First, we use the simplest form of the cd
command, in which the directory name argument is given unquoted.
--> pwd ans = /home/sbasu/Devel/FreeMat4/doc/fragments --> cd .. --> pwd ans = /home/sbasu/Devel/FreeMat4/doc
Next, we use the ``traditional'' form of the function call, using both the parenthesis and a variable to store the quoted string.
--> a = pwd; --> cd(a) --> pwd ans = /home/sbasu/Devel/FreeMat4/doc/fragments