HANDLING CSV FILES IN PYTHON
INTRODUCTION TO CSV FILES
CSV (Comma Separated Values) is a type of plain text file used to store tabular data.
They are a convenient way to export data from spreadsheets and databases as well as
import or use it in other programs.
These files are saved with the .csv file extension.
A CSV file stores tabular data (numbers and text) in plain text. Here’s what the structure
of CSV file looks like:
eno,ename,salary
100,Ram,5000
101,Kiran,6000
Here, each piece of data is separated by a comma.
Normally, the first line identifies each piece of data—in other words, the name of a data
column.
Each record consists of one or more fields, separated by commas.
In general, the separator character is called a delimiter, and other popular delimiters
include the tab (\t), colon (:) and semi-colon (;) characters.
Usually reading a CSV file requires us to know which delimiter is being used.
ADVANTAGES OF CSV FILES
CSV is human readable and easy to edit manually
CSV is processed by almost all existing applications
CSV is easy to handle and smaller in size
CSV is compact and easy to generate
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CSV AND EXCEL FILES
CSV is a format for saving tabular information into a delimited text file with extension
.csv whereas Excel is a spreadsheet that keeps files into its own proprietary format viz
xls or xlsx.
CSV file can’t perform operations on data while Excel can perform operations on the
data.
CSV files are faster and also consumes less memory whereas Excel consumes more
memory while importing data.
CSV files can be opened with any text editor in windows while Excel files can't be
opened with text editors.
PYTHON CSV MODULE
The CSV library in Python provides functionality to both read from and write to CSV file
Before using the CSV module, you need to import it in your program.
import csv
csv.reader()
returns a reader object which iterates over lines of a CSV file
csv.writer()
returns a writer object which writes data into CSV file
OPENING CSV FILE
There are two methods to open a file. These are discussed as follows:
Using open() Function
Python has a built in function – open() to open a file.
The open() function takes two arguments and returns a file object.
SYNTAX
file_object = open(filename [, mode] [,newline=None])
where
filename
is the name of the file to be opened. If the file is not present in the same folder /
directory in which we are working we need to give the complete path where the file is
present.
mode
is an optional parameter and it describes the type of operation we are going to perform
on file like read, write, append etc. Please note that the default mode is reading.
newline is an optional parameter and it tells how newlines mode works (available
values: None, ' ', '\n', 'r', and '\r\n'.)
file_object is the name of the object returned by the open function.
Python File Modes
'r'
Open a file for reading. (default)
'w'
Open a file for writing. Creates a new file if it does not exist or truncates the file if it
exists.
'x'
Open a file for exclusive creation. If the file already exists, the operation fails.
'a'
Open for appending at the end of the file without truncating it. Creates a new file if it
does not exist.
't'
Open in text mode. (default)
'b'
Open in binary mode.
'+'
Open a file for updating (reading and writing)
EXAMPLE 1
file= open("test.csv","w", newline='')
will open a csv file called test.csv for writing purpose.
f = open("test.csv", newline='')
will open a csv file called test.csv for reading purpose.
file= open("example.csv", "a+", newline='')
will open a csv file called example.csv for both appending (writing at the end) and
reading purpose.
Note:
It’s very important to add newline = '' to ensure that no translation of end of line (EOL)
character takes place.
It should always be safe to specify newline='', since the csv module does its own
(universal) newline handling.
USING WITH STATEMENT
Apart from using open() function for creation of file, with statement can also be used.
Using with ensures that all the resources allocated to file objects gets deallocated
automatically once we stop using the file.
Swith open("example.csv","r+", newline='') as file:
file manipulation statements
CLOSING CSV FILE
After performing desired operations on file, we need to close it. This can be done using
an in-built function- close().
SYNTAX
fileobject. close()
Closing a file frees up the resources that were tied with the file.
Before closing a file, any material which is not written in file, is flushed off i.e. written to
file. So, it is a good practice to close the file once we have finished using it.
If we reassign the file object to some other file, Python will automatically close the file
attached to it earlier.
WRITING INTO A CSV FILE
To write into a CSV file in Python, we can use the csv.writer() function.
The csv.writer() function returns a writer object that converts the user's data into a
delimited string.
This string can later be used to write into CSV files using the writerow() or the
writerows() function.
SYNTAX
writer_object=csv.writer(file-handle [,delimiter])
Here, delimiter parameter is optional.
If it not specified then the default delimiter character i.e. comma is taken.
If it is specified then the specified character is taken as the delimiter character.
USING WRITEROW() FUNCTION
The writerow() function is used to write a single row to the specified CSV file.
EXAMPLE 3
Write a Python script to create a file students.csv having fields rollno, name and total
and write three records into it.
import csv
with open('student.csv', 'w', newline='') as file:
writer = csv.writer(file)
writer.writerow(["Rollno", "Name", "Total"])
writer.writerow([1, "Rajeev", 350])
writer.writerow([2, "Sanjay", 440])
writer.writerow([3, "Neelam", 450])
OUTPUT
No output is generated after running the above code.
When we run the above program, a student.csv file is created with the following
content:
USING WRITEROWS() FUNCTION
The writerows() function is used to write multiple rows to the specified CSV file. For e.g.
it can be used to write the contents of the 2-dimensional list to a CSV file.
EXAMPLE 4
Write a Python script to create a file students.csv having fields rollno, name and total
and write three records into it using writerrows() function.
import csv
csv_rowlist = [["Rollno", "name", "Total"], [1, "Amit", 350], [2, "Beena", 440], [3, "Rajat", 450]]
with open('stu.csv', 'w') as file:
writer = csv.writer(file)
writer.writerows(csv_rowlist)
OUTPUT
No output is generated after running the above code. When we run the above program, a
stu.csv file is created with the following content:
. As newline parameter was not added at the time of opening of file thus a blank line has
been inserted after every row.
The blank line can be removed by adding newline='' to the open function.
Writing to a CSV File with CUSTOM Delimiter
CSV files can be written in different formats. By default, a comma is used as a delimiter
in a CSV file. However, other delimiter characters like | and \t can also be used in CSV
files. Here, we will then learn how to customize the csv.writer() function to write them.
EXAMPLE 5
Write a Python script to create a file students.csv having fields rollno, name and total
and use TAB as a delimiter.
import csv
with open('student2.csv', 'w', newline='') as file:
writer = csv.writer(file, delimiter = '\t')
writer.writerow(["Rollno", "Name", "Total"])
writer.writerow([1, "Rajeev", 350])
writer.writerow([2, "Sanjay", 440])
writer.writerow([3, "Neelam", 450])
OUTPUT
No output is generated after running the above code. When we run the above program, a
student2.csv file is created with the following content:
WORKING
The program is similar to the programs we have already written except for the optional
parameter delimiter = '\t' in the csv.writer() function. The csv file created has tab as the
delimiter character instead of comma.
READING CSV FILES
To read a CSV file in Python, we can use the csv.reader() function. It returns a reader
object which iterates over lines of a CSV file.
READ CSV FILE HAVING COMMA DELIMITER
EXAMPLE
Write a Python script to read a file students.csv having fields rollno, name and total and
display all information stored in that file.
import csv
with open('student.csv', 'r') as file:
reader = csv.reader(file)
for row in reader:
print(row)
OUTPUT
['Rollno', 'Name', 'Total']
['1', 'Rajeev', '350']
['2', 'Sanjay', '440']
['3', 'Neelam', '450']
WORKING
First, we first open the CSV file in READ mode. The file object is named as file. Next, we
create the reader object. The reader object stores the parsed data in the form of
iterable. The reader object is then iterated using a for loop to print the contents of each
row. Each row returned by the reader is a list of string elements containing the data
found by removing the delimiters. The first row returned contains the column names,
which is handled in a special way.
READ CSV FILE HAVING CUSTOM DELIMITER
In the above example, we are using the csv.reader() function in default mode for CSV
files having comma delimiter. Suppose our CSV file is using tab as a delimiter. To read
such files, we can pass optional parameters to the csv.reader() function. Let's take an
example.
EXAMPLE
Write a Python script to read a file student2.csv having fields rollno, name and total and
having tab as the delimiter. Display all information stored in that file.
import csv
with open('student2.csv', 'r',) as file:
reader = csv.reader(file, delimiter = '\t')
for row in reader:
print(row)
OUTPUT
['Rollno', 'Name', 'Total']
['1', 'Rajeev', '350']
['2', 'Sanjay', '440']
['3', 'Neelam', '450']
WORKING
Here, we have added delimiter = '\t' in the reader() function so as to facilitate reading of
csv file having delimiter as tab.
