please help

i am using the code from a former student. i run it and i gave me this error:

   ??? Undefined function or method 'Political' for input arguments of
type 'char'.

what does it mean? how can i change it right? the code is given as below from the former student.

X = xlsread('Political 2008.xlsx','sheet1','A1:G83');
Y = xlsread('Political 2008.xlsx','sheet1','H1:H83');
s = length (Y(1,:));
m = length (X(1,:));
for j = 1:83
  f = [-Y(j,:) zeros(1,m)]';
  Aeq = [zeros(1,s) X(j,:)];
  beq = 1;
  A = [Y -X];
  b = zeros(83,1);
  lb = zeros(m+s,1);
  uv(:,j) = LINPROG(f,A,b,Aeq,beq,lb);
  h(j) = -f'*uv(:,j);
end

please help. thank you

Answer 1

[Fangjun Jiang]

It's a little strange because you are not using "Political" as a variable or function.

My guess is that: 1) Your Excel version is different than the origianl intended. 2) The file "Political 2008.xlsx" is not in your current folder. 3) Your MATLAB version might have problem with the Excel file name with a white space in it.

Try to copy the "Political 2008.xlsx" file to your current folder, re-name it so it doesn't contain white space in the name, change the Excel file name in the above code and run it again.

[Titus Edelhofer]

Additionally: take a look at what "which xlsread" gives. Is it something like <matlab>\toolbox or some function of yours or a variable?

[Titus Edelhofer]

And by the way: you will need to write linprog instead of LINPROG.

[kelvin lee]

i didnt know different excel versions will affect. i will take a look on that. @fangjun jiang, the white space didnt seem to have any effect. :/

@titus, i will take a look on that too. thanks for the LINPROG advice

[Titus Edelhofer]

Hi Kelvin, one last question: in which line of the code does the error occur, in the line with "xlsread"?

[Malcolm Lidierth]

@Titus

My guess is not.

>> Political 2008.xlsx

Undefined function 'Political' for input arguments of type 'char'.

[kelvin lee]

@Titus, what malcolm said was correct. its a undefined function problem. but im not sure what is wrong. i went back to check the values in the excel file to see if there are any blanks, but then all cells inside are filled. and still produce the same error code. troubled me. ):

Answer 2

[kelvin lee]

hi guys. i have solved the problem. the solution is from all the answers you guys have helped. thank you so much.

first, i have to remove the blank space in the .m file. to Political2008.m

then i converted the .xlsx file to .xls from Office 2007 to Office 2003.

finally changed LINPROG to linprog.

and i got it running. (:

[Fangjun Jiang]

Interesting! I guess everyone has a lesson learned here.