STR2NUM STR2NUM Convert a String to a Number

Usage

Converts a string to a number.  The general syntax for its use
is

  x = str2num(string)

Here string is the data string, which contains the data to 
be converted into a number.  The output is in double precision,
and must be typecasted to the appropriate type based on what
you need.  Note that by definition, str2num is entirely 
equivalent to eval(['[' string ']'],[]) with all of the 
associated problems where string contains text that causes
side effects.
