I'd like to merge two different tables on matlab, how do I do that?

Hello to anyone reading this,

I have two excel tables which I'd like to merge into one big table / array. Basically, they all have different columns, and different number of rows and lines. The only similar thing is the first column, which is time (in seconds). Some values are similar in both tables, while others are different.

If possible, I'd like to merge the two tables into one big table without losing any data. Example of what I have / want:

Have:

Time1 = ["t1";"t2";"t3"];
value1 = [374; 164; 476];
value2 = [2455;5478;2354];
value3 = [53782;35683;24682];
table1 = table(Time1, value1, value2, value3)

table1 = 3×4 table
    Time1    value1    value2    value3
    _____    ______    ______    ______

    "t1"      374       2455     53782 
    "t2"      164       5478     35683 
    "t3"      476       2354     24682 

Time2 = ["t1";"t4"];
value4 = [257;31572];
value5 = [247;3578];
table2 = table(Time2, value4, value5)

table2 = 2×3 table
    Time2    value4    value5
    _____    ______    ______

    "t1"       257       247 
    "t4"     31572      3578 

I'd like to get:

Time3 = ["t1";'t2';'t3';'t4'];
value1 = [374; 164; 476;""];
value2 = [2455;5478;2354;""];
value3 = [53782;35683;24682;""];
value4 = [257;"";"";31572];
value5 = [247;"";"";3578];
table3 = table(Time3, value1, value2, value3, value4, value5)

table3 = 4×6 table
    Time3    value1    value2    value3     value4     value5
    _____    ______    ______    _______    _______    ______

    "t1"     "374"     "2455"    "53782"    "257"      "247" 
    "t2"     "164"     "5478"    "35683"    ""         ""    
    "t3"     "476"     "2354"    "24682"    ""         ""    
    "t4"     ""        ""        ""         "31572"    "3578"

I'd appreciate any help/advice with that, thanks in advance!

Important: my table contains both numbers and words.

(Small disclaimer: i'm fairly new to matlab so don't know much about it yet)

[Walter Roberson]

innerjoin perhaps

[Anat Lazikin]

any type of join gives me this error:

"Unable to concatenate the table variables 'Seconds_s_' and 'Marker', because their types are double and cell."

my table1 has both numbers and words, I'm guessing this is the issue but i must have them both

Answer 1

[Matt J]

Time1 = ["t1";"t2";"t3"];
value1 = [374; 164; 476];
value2 = [2455;5478;2354];
value3 = [53782;35683;24682];
table1 = table(Time1, value1, value2, value3,'Var',{'Time','V1','V2','V3'})

table1 = 3×4 table
    Time    V1      V2      V3  
    ____    ___    ____    _____

    "t1"    374    2455    53782
    "t2"    164    5478    35683
    "t3"    476    2354    24682

Time2 = ["t1";"t4"];
value4 = [257;31572];
value5 = [247;3578];
table2 = table(Time2, value4, value5,'Var',{'Time','V4','V5'})

table2 = 2×3 table
    Time     V4       V5 
    ____    _____    ____

    "t1"      257     247
    "t4"    31572    3578

table3 = outerjoin(table1,table2,'MergeKeys',1)

table3 = 4×6 table
    Time    V1      V2      V3       V4       V5 
    ____    ___    ____    _____    _____    ____

    "t1"    374    2455    53782      257     247
    "t2"    164    5478    35683      NaN     NaN
    "t3"    476    2354    24682      NaN     NaN
    "t4"    NaN     NaN      NaN    31572    3578

[Anat Lazikin]

I tried but it gave me the error "Unable to concatenate the table variables 'Seconds_s_' and 'Marker', because their types are double and cell."

Only reason I can imagine is that "marker" contains words, while "seconds" has numbers?

[Walter Roberson]

The implication of the error message is that Seconds_s_ and Marker each occur in both tables, but in one of the tables they are double and in the other table they are cell .

When you have the same variable in both tables, then in order to join the tables, the variable must be compatible types in the two tables.