History of previously opened m-files in MATLAB - history

Question

Is anyway to find history of previously opened m-files in MATLAB R2014b from 2 or 3 months ago? (a list of name of files and paths)

Answer 1

Matlab R2014b stores its recent files in:
%APPDATA%\MathWorks\MATLAB\R2014b\MATLAB_Editor_State.xml
It's a .xml file so it's easy to load and parse with xmlread. I'm not very familiar with xml parsing syntax, but here is how to get information about files (to be adapted to your needs of course):
function [recentFiles] = GetRecentFiles()
%[
% Opens editor's state file
filepart = sprintf('MathWorks\\MATLAB\\R%s\\%s', version('-release'), 'MATLAB_Editor_State.xml');
filename = fullfile(getenv('APPDATA'), filepart);
document = xmlread(filename);
% Get information about 'File' nodes
recentFiles = struct([]);
fileNodes = document.getElementsByTagName('File');
for fni = 1:(fileNodes.getLength())
attributes = fileNodes.item(fni-1).getAttributes(); % Careful, zero based indexing !
for ai = 1:(attributes.getLength())
% Get node attribute
name = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getName()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
value = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getValue()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
% Save in structure
name(1) = upper(name(1)); % Just because I prefer capital letter for field names ...
recentFiles(fni).(name) = value;
end
end
%]
end
This returns a structure like this:
recentFiles =
1x43 struct array with fields:
AbsPath
LastWrittenTime
Name
NB: I've tried to type in matlab command window matlab.desktop.editor.*, but seems there's nothing regarding recent files (anyway there are a lot of interesting things to manipulate the editor from the command line)

Answer 2

Last answer waIs really helpful. I've just modified it to read and open the recent tab files. This works on Matlab R2013a:
function [recentFiles] = recover_tabs()
%[
% Opens editor's state file
filepart = sprintf('MathWorks\\MATLAB\\R%s\\%s', version('-release'), 'MATLAB_Editor_State.xml');
filename = fullfile(getenv('APPDATA'), filepart);
document = xmlread(filename);
% Get information about 'File' nodes
recentFiles = struct([]);
fileNodes = document.getElementsByTagName('File');
for fni = 1:(fileNodes.getLength())
attributes = fileNodes.item(fni-1).getAttributes(); % Careful, zero based indexing !
for ai = 1:(attributes.getLength())
% Get node attribute
name = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getName()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
value = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getValue()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
% Save in structure
name(1) = upper(name(1)); % Just because I prefer capital letter for field names ...
recentFiles(fni).(name) = value;
end
end
% loop to access files in the tab history
for j=1:length(recentFiles)
arquivo = [recentFiles(j).AbsPath '\' recentFiles(j).Name];
% if exists, then open
if exist(arquivo, 'file') == 2
open(arquivo);
end
end
%]
end

Answer 3

Base in the answer by CitizenInsane, but for any Matlab version.
To find the .xml file in any Matlab version, use prefdir:
>> prefdir
ans = '/Users/user/Library/Application Support/MathWorks/MATLAB/R2018a'
MATLAB_Editor_State.xml will be stored there. Therefore the fuction would be:
function [recentFiles] = GetRecentFiles()
% Opens editor's state file
filepart = sprintf([ prefdir '/MATLAB_Editor_State.xml']);
filename = fullfile(getenv('APPDATA'), filepart);
document = xmlread(filename);
% Get information about 'File' nodes
recentFiles = struct([]);
fileNodes = document.getElementsByTagName('File');
for fni = 1:(fileNodes.getLength())
attributes = fileNodes.item(fni-1).getAttributes(); % Careful, zero based indexing !
for ai = 1:(attributes.getLength())
% Get node attribute
name = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getName()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
value = char(attributes.item(ai-1).getValue()); % Zero based + need marshaling COM 'string' type
% Save in structure
name(1) = upper(name(1)); % Just because I prefer capital letter for field names ...
recentFiles(fni).(name) = value;
end
end

Answer 4

In R2018b you can increase the Most recently used file list in Preferences > Editor/Debugger. I like the methods above, but they do not work if you're working across machines (e.g., using Github). I coded a solution that uses the modified file date from the machine, instead of relying on MATLAB itself.