title: Extract .mat data without matlab - tried scilab unsuccessfully
body: <p>I've downloaded a data set that I am interested in. However, it is in .mat format and I do not have access to Matlab.</p>
  
  <p>I've done some googling and it says I can open it in SciLab. </p>
  
  <p>I tried a few things, but I haven't found any good tutorials on this.</p>
  
  <p>I did </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <blockquote>
      <p>fd = matfile_open("file.mat")</p>
      
      <p>matfile_listvar(fd)</p>
    </blockquote>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>and that prints out the filename without the extension. I tried</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <blockquote>
      <p>var1 = matfile_varreadnext(fd)</p>
    </blockquote>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>and that just gives me "var1  =   "</p>
  
  <p>I don't really know how the data is organized. The repository described the data it contains, but not how it is organized.</p>
  
  <p>So, my question is, what am I doing wrong in extracting/viewing this data? I'm not committed to SciLab, if there is a better tool for this I am open to that.</p>