why can't find find my numbers

Hello,
I am trying to subset some data by time period. After loading the
data into matlab, i check the first column(time-serial date) for a
match against an element in a vector of times(serial date).

find(data,1) == timevec(3));

This returns an empty matrix. The i checked the data in in the
workspace and I can see the number(s) in the array editor. They
match exactly to the values in timevec.
Matlab does find the first of three times but not the last two.
None of these work
intersect(dataarray,1), timevec);
newtime=dataarray,1) == timevec(2 or 3));

What could be the problem?
I did try with some random times earlier than the ones that I need
and all the above worked.

 

Post a small subset of your data, showing something you think should
work that doesn't. I'm sure we can help...
Brett

 

They may look the same but the last bit or two may be different. For the
section of your data that appears to contain the exact value of timevec(3),
compute "data(thatblock)-timevec(3)". You should see some the results that
are very close to, but not exactly equal to, zero. [You may need to use
FORMAT LONG G to see the results to more than just 4 decimal places.]

Look at:

http://www.mathworks.com/support/solutions/data/1-16FOQ.html?solution=1-16FOQ

and question 5.1 in the newsgroup FAQ:

http://www.mit.edu/~pwb/cssm/

 

I found the problem with find. The numbers differed by 1x10-9 *
..012.........
I talked to the people that create the files and told them they need
to modifiy the output to prevent this. We found we could not keep
the time in matlab serial format because the errors keep occuring.
We decided on an integer yyyymmddHHSS since the new version of
datanum lets us convert it back easily.
Everyone using the data did not have the mapping toolbox installed so
roundn, which worked, could not be coded into the program.
Thanks so much to everyone for their input.
Viva the newsgroup.
r pearson