class_docstr: Class to read matlab 4 variables 
class_docstr_tok: ["Class","to","read","matlab","4","variables"]
docstr: latin-1 text matrix (char matrix) reader
  
  Parameters
  ----------
  hdr : ``VarHeader4`` instance
  
  Returns
  -------
  arr : ndarray
      with dtype 'U1', shape given by `hdr` ``dims``
docstr_tok: ["latin-1","text","matrix","(","char","matrix",")","reader","Parameters","--","--","--","--","--","hdr",":","``","VarHeader4","``","instance","Returns","--","--","--","-","arr",":","ndarray","with","dtype","'U1","'",",","shape","given","by","`","hdr","`","``","dims","``"]
code: def read_char_array(self, hdr):
      """latin-1 text matrix (char matrix) reader
  
      Parameters
      ----------
      hdr : ``VarHeader4`` instance
  
      Returns
      -------
      arr : ndarray
          with dtype 'U1', shape given by `hdr` ``dims``
      """
      arr = self.read_sub_array(hdr).astype(np.uint8)
      S = arr.tobytes().decode("latin-1")
      return np.ndarray(
          shape=hdr.dims, dtype=np.dtype("U1"), buffer=np.array(S)
      ).copy()
  
imports: import sys
  import warnings
  import numpy
  import scipy.sparse
  from .miobase import MatFileReader, docfiller, matdims, read_dtype, convert_dtypes, arr_to_chars, arr_dtype_number
  from .mio_utils import squeeze_element, chars_to_strings
  from functools import reduce
label_desc: Use image node_id 6 for calling the VarReader4 obj's underlying member method code with example usage: obj.read_char_array(hdr) and returns: np