title: MATLAB, ASCII files. Textscan? importdata? load? none of them works
body: <p>I have to import ASCII files in MATLAB and then have them read. These are the functions I tried out with:</p>
  
  <p>1) <code>load(filename)</code> does not work: it says "number of columns on line 2 of ASCII file must be the same as previous lines"</p>
  
  <p>2) <code>textscan(file, '-ascii')</code> returns something like "Empty cell array: 1-by-0</p>
  
  <p>3) <code>importdata(file)</code> returns " data: [2x1 double], textdata: [4x1 cell], colheaders {'*LOS='}.
  It actually works, as suggested  by georgesl, but it treats the full text as a unique column: how can I skip the header and then split the data into 2 columns? </p>
  
  <p>I have noticed everything is all right if I convert the ascii file into a dat one, but I have many files (more than 100) that should be worked out.</p>
  
  <p>What should I do?</p>
  
  <p>Thanks</p>