Left digits

if I have a number such as 1234, how can I select the left 3 digits 123?

Answer 1

[Sean de Wolski]

left3 = @(x)str2double(x(1:3));
left3(num2str(1234))

Perhaps?

Or so it doesn't error on numbers < 100

left3 = @(x)str2double(x(1:min(3,length(x))));

[Matt Fig]

num2str(1234)

Answer 2

[Walter Roberson]

You can do it arithmetically with something like

floor(x ./ 10.^ceil(log10(x+1)-3))

provided the values are at least 100

Answer 3

[Paulo Silva]

 n=num2str(1234)
 n1=str2num(n(1:end-1))