netcdf.defVlen

Define a new NC_VLEN type in a new NetCDF-4 file. Then, create and write a variable of this type. An NC_VLEN type corresponds to a cell array in MATLAB®.

Create a NetCDF-4 file named myfile.nc.

source = "myfile.nc";
cmode = "NETCDF4";
ncid = netcdf.create(source,cmode);

Define a new NC_VLEN type with the MY_VARIABLE_LENGTH_SAMPLE type name and NC_FLOAT base type.

typeName = "MY_VARIABLE_LENGTH_SAMPLE";
baseType = "NC_FLOAT";
typeid = netcdf.defVlen(ncid,typeName,baseType);

Create a new TIME dimension with the length 3 in the NetCDF file.

dimname = "TIME";
dimlen = 3;
dimid = netcdf.defDim(ncid,dimname,dimlen);

Create a new variable named samples of the NC_VLEN type and with the TIME dimension.

varname = "samples";
varid = netcdf.defVar(ncid,varname,typeid,dimid);

Write the data to the NetCDF variable. The data is a cell array that contains arrays of single values. The NC_FLOAT NetCDF data type corresponds to the single data type in MATLAB.

data = {single([0.1,0.2]),single([2.333,7.94,0.5,0]),single(4.2)};
netcdf.putVar(ncid,varid,data)

Close the NetCDF file.

netcdf.close(ncid)

Show the datatype and dimensions of the samples variable using the ncinfo function. The Variables field of the info structure shows the datatype that you defined and the Dimensions subfield shows the dimension that you defined.

info = ncinfo(source);
info.Variables

ans = struct with fields:
            Name: 'samples'
      Dimensions: [1x1 struct]
            Size: 3
        Datatype: 'MY_VARIABLE_LENGTH_SAMPLE'
      Attributes: []
       ChunkSize: []
       FillValue: {[]}
    DeflateLevel: []
         Shuffle: 0

info.Variables.Dimensions

ans = struct with fields:
         Name: 'TIME'
       Length: 3
    Unlimited: 0