How to load partial cell content from a .mat file?

Hello,

I have a mat file which contains a structure. One field contains a cell array. Each cell of this array contains a numeric array. I want to load part of that numeric array without loading the rest of the file into memory. Using h5read, I can load a single field and single numeric array, but I cannot load only part of that array. I believe lower level HDF5 functions should be able to accomplish this, but they are beyond my skill. Has anyone solved this? What I have accomplished is below.

 % Load single cell from single field
 % (user must supply filename,fieldname, and cell index)
finfo = hdf5info(filename);
grpidx = cellfun(@(x) x(2)~='#',{finfo.GroupHierarchy.Groups.Name});
if numel(grpidx)>2
  error('Files with multible variables are not supported.')
end
[~,fn] = cellfun(@fileparts,{finfo.GroupHierarchy.Groups(grpidx).Datasets.Name},'uni',0);
dsidx = ismember(fn,fieldname);
out = h5read(filename,finfo.GroupHierarchy.Groups(grpidx).Datasets(dsidx).Name,cell_idx,1,1);

Thank you,

-Burke Rosen

[per isakson]

Doc says: "Note: hdf5info will be removed in a future version. Use h5info instead."

"Has anyone solved this?" &nbsp Yes, something similar on R2013b, but I hesitate to try it again.

To start, mat-version -v7.3 comes with a rather height price both regarding size and speed.

If the "numeric array" is huge and speed is critical - maybe.