1.3. Batch conversion

This is a tutorial on how to use CoFFee to batch-convert several files. Replace the paths appropriately.

Start from a clean slate:

clear all
close all
restoredefaultpath();
clc

Set location of CoFFee code root folder and add to path:

coffeeFolder = 'C:\Users\Schimel_Alexandre\Code\MATLAB\CoFFee';
addpath(genpath(coffeeFolder));

Use CFF_list_raw_files_in_dir to create a list of raw data files for conversion. It is a versatile function with a few useful parameters. Previous tutorials already covered how to:

• Choose the file formats to search for (e.g. '.all', '.wcd', '.kmall', '.kmwcd', '.s7k'). To list pairs of files in the Kongsberg formats, use '.all/.wcd' or '.kmall/.kmwcd'. By default, the function searches for all of those, and pair all pairable files (if they are in the same folder).
• Specify the number of files to get from the folder (e.g. 'nFilesWanted', 1).

Another useful option is to search recursively in subfolders. By default, CFF_list_raw_files_in_dir is NOT recursive, i.e. it does not look into subfolders. Set the recursiveSearch parameter to true to search dataFolder recursively:

dataFolder = 'C:\Users\Schimel_Alexandre\Data\MBES\Kongsberg all\EM2040C\Deakin_2014_EM2040c_Kelp-Pilot-Study';
rawFilesList = CFF_list_raw_files_in_dir(dataFolder,'recursiveSearch',true,'filesType','.all/.wcd');
CFF_print_raw_files_list(rawFilesList);

For this tutorial, we will use a larger set of larger set of .all files:

dataFolder = 'C:\Users\Schimel_Alexandre\Data\MBES\Kongsberg all\EM710\KV-FOSAE-2015_EM710_BH03_extracts';
rawFilesList = CFF_list_raw_files_in_dir(dataFolder,0,'.all');
CFF_print_raw_files_list(rawFilesList);

Batch-convert the first three files. Use the comms parameters to follow progress:

fDataGroup = CFF_convert_raw_files(rawFilesList(1:3),'conversionType','seafloor',...
    'comms','multilines');

This command converted data from the first three files and returned the converted data as output. This is not a great solution for large datasets because conversion can take a while and loading all converted data can overfill the memory available. For a large dataset, you may find it preferable to first "batch-convert-and-save" the data (clearing the memory after each conversion), and later load the converted data you need.

You can modify the parameters of CFF_convert_raw_files to do the batch-convert-and-save step:

CFF_convert_raw_files(rawFilesList,'conversionType','seafloor',...
    'saveFDataToDrive', 1, ...
    'outputFData', 0, ... 
    'comms','multilines');

And then use CFF_load_converted_files to load a smaller subset of converted data:

fDataGroup = CFF_load_converted_files(rawFilesList(1:3), ...
    'comms','multilines');