:mod:`csv` --- CSV File Reading and Writing
.. module:: csv :synopsis: Write and read tabular data to and from delimited files.
.. sectionauthor:: Skip Montanaro <skip.montanaro@gmail.com>
Source code: :source:`Lib/csv.py`
.. index:: single: csv pair: data; tabular
The so-called CSV (Comma Separated Values) format is the most common import and export format for spreadsheets and databases. CSV format was used for many years prior to attempts to describe the format in a standardized way in RFC 4180. The lack of a well-defined standard means that subtle differences often exist in the data produced and consumed by different applications. These differences can make it annoying to process CSV files from multiple sources. Still, while the delimiters and quoting characters vary, the overall format is similar enough that it is possible to write a single module which can efficiently manipulate such data, hiding the details of reading and writing the data from the programmer.
The :mod:`csv` module implements classes to read and write tabular data in CSV format. It allows programmers to say, "write this data in the format preferred by Excel," or "read data from this file which was generated by Excel," without knowing the precise details of the CSV format used by Excel. Programmers can also describe the CSV formats understood by other applications or define their own special-purpose CSV formats.
The :mod:`csv` module's :class:`reader` and :class:`writer` objects read and write sequences. Programmers can also read and write data in dictionary form using the :class:`DictReader` and :class:`DictWriter` classes.
.. seealso::
:pep:`305` - CSV File API
The Python Enhancement Proposal which proposed this addition to Python.
The :mod:`csv` module defines the following functions:
.. index:: single: universal newlines; csv.reader function
.. function:: reader(csvfile, dialect='excel', **fmtparams)
Return a :ref:`reader object <reader-objects>` that will process
lines from the given *csvfile*. A csvfile must be an iterable of
strings, each in the reader's defined csv format.
A csvfile is most commonly a file-like object or list.
If *csvfile* is a file object,
it should be opened with ``newline=''``. [1]_ An optional
*dialect* parameter can be given which is used to define a set of parameters
specific to a particular CSV dialect. It may be an instance of a subclass of
the :class:`Dialect` class or one of the strings returned by the
:func:`list_dialects` function. The other optional *fmtparams* keyword arguments
can be given to override individual formatting parameters in the current
dialect. For full details about the dialect and formatting parameters, see
section :ref:`csv-fmt-params`.
Each row read from the csv file is returned as a list of strings. No
automatic data type conversion is performed unless the ``QUOTE_NONNUMERIC`` format
option is specified (in which case unquoted fields are transformed into floats).
A short usage example::
>>> import csv
>>> with open('eggs.csv', newline='') as csvfile:
... spamreader = csv.reader(csvfile, delimiter=' ', quotechar='|')
... for row in spamreader:
... print(', '.join(row))
Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Baked Beans
Spam, Lovely Spam, Wonderful Spam
.. function:: writer(csvfile, dialect='excel', **fmtparams)
Return a writer object responsible for converting the user's data into delimited
strings on the given file-like object. *csvfile* can be any object with a
:meth:`~io.TextIOBase.write` method. If *csvfile* is a file object, it should be opened with
``newline=''`` [1]_. An optional *dialect*
parameter can be given which is used to define a set of parameters specific to a
particular CSV dialect. It may be an instance of a subclass of the
:class:`Dialect` class or one of the strings returned by the
:func:`list_dialects` function. The other optional *fmtparams* keyword arguments
can be given to override individual formatting parameters in the current
dialect. For full details about dialects and formatting parameters, see
the :ref:`csv-fmt-params` section. To make it
as easy as possible to interface with modules which implement the DB API, the
value :const:`None` is written as the empty string. While this isn't a
reversible transformation, it makes it easier to dump SQL NULL data values to
CSV files without preprocessing the data returned from a ``cursor.fetch*`` call.
All other non-string data are stringified with :func:`str` before being written.
A short usage example::
import csv
with open('eggs.csv', 'w', newline='') as csvfile:
spamwriter = csv.writer(csvfile, delimiter=' ',
quotechar='|', quoting=csv.QUOTE_MINIMAL)
spamwriter.writerow(['Spam'] * 5 + ['Baked Beans'])
spamwriter.writerow(['Spam', 'Lovely Spam', 'Wonderful Spam'])
.. function:: register_dialect(name[, dialect[, **fmtparams]]) Associate *dialect* with *name*. *name* must be a string. The dialect can be specified either by passing a sub-class of :class:`Dialect`, or by *fmtparams* keyword arguments, or both, with keyword arguments overriding parameters of the dialect. For full details about dialects and formatting parameters, see section :ref:`csv-fmt-params`.
.. function:: unregister_dialect(name) Delete the dialect associated with *name* from the dialect registry. An :exc:`Error` is raised if *name* is not a registered dialect name.
.. function:: get_dialect(name) Return the dialect associated with *name*. An :exc:`Error` is raised if *name* is not a registered dialect name. This function returns an immutable :class:`Dialect`.
.. function:: list_dialects() Return the names of all registered dialects.
.. function:: field_size_limit([new_limit]) Returns the current maximum field size allowed by the parser. If *new_limit* is given, this becomes the new limit.
The :mod:`csv` module defines the following classes:
The :class:`Dialect` class is a container class whose attributes contain information for how to handle doublequotes, whitespace, delimiters, etc. Due to the lack of a strict CSV specification, different applications produce subtly different CSV data. :class:`Dialect` instances define how :class:`reader` and :class:`writer` instances behave.
All available :class:`Dialect` names are returned by :func:`list_dialects`,
and they can be registered with specific :class:`reader` and :class:`writer`
classes through their initializer (__init__) functions like this:
import csv
with open('students.csv', 'w', newline='') as csvfile:
writer = csv.writer(csvfile, dialect='unix')
The :class:`excel` class defines the usual properties of an Excel-generated CSV
file. It is registered with the dialect name 'excel'.
The :class:`excel_tab` class defines the usual properties of an Excel-generated
TAB-delimited file. It is registered with the dialect name 'excel-tab'.
The :class:`unix_dialect` class defines the usual properties of a CSV file
generated on UNIX systems, i.e. using '\n' as line terminator and quoting
all fields. It is registered with the dialect name 'unix'.
.. versionadded:: 3.2
The :class:`Sniffer` class is used to deduce the format of a CSV file.
The :class:`Sniffer` class provides two methods:
.. method:: sniff(sample, delimiters=None) Analyze the given *sample* and return a :class:`Dialect` subclass reflecting the parameters found. If the optional *delimiters* parameter is given, it is interpreted as a string containing possible valid delimiter characters.
.. method:: has_header(sample)
Analyze the sample text (presumed to be in CSV format) and return
:const:`True` if the first row appears to be a series of column headers.
Inspecting each column, one of two key criteria will be considered to
estimate if the sample contains a header:
- the second through n-th rows contain numeric values
- the second through n-th rows contain strings where at least one value's
length differs from that of the putative header of that column.
Twenty rows after the first row are sampled; if more than half of columns +
rows meet the criteria, :const:`True` is returned.
Note
This method is a rough heuristic and may produce both false positives and negatives.
An example for :class:`Sniffer` use:
with open('example.csv', newline='') as csvfile:
dialect = csv.Sniffer().sniff(csvfile.read(1024))
csvfile.seek(0)
reader = csv.reader(csvfile, dialect)
# ... process CSV file contents here ...
The :mod:`csv` module defines the following constants:
.. data:: QUOTE_ALL Instructs :class:`writer` objects to quote all fields.
.. data:: QUOTE_MINIMAL Instructs :class:`writer` objects to only quote those fields which contain special characters such as *delimiter*, *quotechar* or any of the characters in *lineterminator*.
.. data:: QUOTE_NONNUMERIC Instructs :class:`writer` objects to quote all non-numeric fields. Instructs :class:`reader` objects to convert all non-quoted fields to type *float*.
.. data:: QUOTE_NONE Instructs :class:`writer` objects to never quote fields. When the current *delimiter* occurs in output data it is preceded by the current *escapechar* character. If *escapechar* is not set, the writer will raise :exc:`Error` if any characters that require escaping are encountered. Instructs :class:`reader` objects to perform no special processing of quote characters.
.. data:: QUOTE_NOTNULL Instructs :class:`writer` objects to quote all fields which are not ``None``. This is similar to :data:`QUOTE_ALL`, except that if a field value is ``None`` an empty (unquoted) string is written. Instructs :class:`reader` objects to interpret an empty (unquoted) field as None and to otherwise behave as :data:`QUOTE_ALL`. .. versionadded:: 3.12
.. data:: QUOTE_STRINGS Instructs :class:`writer` objects to always place quotes around fields which are strings. This is similar to :data:`QUOTE_NONNUMERIC`, except that if a field value is ``None`` an empty (unquoted) string is written. Instructs :class:`reader` objects to interpret an empty (unquoted) string as ``None`` and to otherwise behave as :data:`QUOTE_NONNUMERIC`. .. versionadded:: 3.12
The :mod:`csv` module defines the following exception:
.. exception:: Error Raised by any of the functions when an error is detected.
To make it easier to specify the format of input and output records, specific formatting parameters are grouped together into dialects. A dialect is a subclass of the :class:`Dialect` class containing various attributes describing the format of the CSV file. When creating :class:`reader` or :class:`writer` objects, the programmer can specify a string or a subclass of the :class:`Dialect` class as the dialect parameter. In addition to, or instead of, the dialect parameter, the programmer can also specify individual formatting parameters, which have the same names as the attributes defined below for the :class:`Dialect` class.
Dialects support the following attributes:
.. attribute:: Dialect.delimiter A one-character string used to separate fields. It defaults to ``','``.
.. attribute:: Dialect.doublequote Controls how instances of *quotechar* appearing inside a field should themselves be quoted. When :const:`True`, the character is doubled. When :const:`False`, the *escapechar* is used as a prefix to the *quotechar*. It defaults to :const:`True`. On output, if *doublequote* is :const:`False` and no *escapechar* is set, :exc:`Error` is raised if a *quotechar* is found in a field.
.. attribute:: Dialect.escapechar
A one-character string used by the writer to escape the *delimiter* if *quoting*
is set to :const:`QUOTE_NONE` and the *quotechar* if *doublequote* is
:const:`False`. On reading, the *escapechar* removes any special meaning from
the following character. It defaults to :const:`None`, which disables escaping.
.. versionchanged:: 3.11
An empty *escapechar* is not allowed.
.. attribute:: Dialect.lineterminator
The string used to terminate lines produced by the :class:`writer`. It defaults
to ``'\r\n'``.
.. note::
The :class:`reader` is hard-coded to recognise either ``'\r'`` or ``'\n'`` as
end-of-line, and ignores *lineterminator*. This behavior may change in the
future.
.. attribute:: Dialect.quotechar
A one-character string used to quote fields containing special characters, such
as the *delimiter* or *quotechar*, or which contain new-line characters. It
defaults to ``'"'``.
.. versionchanged:: 3.11
An empty *quotechar* is not allowed.
.. attribute:: Dialect.quoting Controls when quotes should be generated by the writer and recognised by the reader. It can take on any of the :ref:`QUOTE_\* constants <csv-constants>` and defaults to :const:`QUOTE_MINIMAL`.
.. attribute:: Dialect.skipinitialspace When :const:`True`, spaces immediately following the *delimiter* are ignored. The default is :const:`False`.
.. attribute:: Dialect.strict When ``True``, raise exception :exc:`Error` on bad CSV input. The default is ``False``.
Reader objects (:class:`DictReader` instances and objects returned by the :func:`reader` function) have the following public methods:
.. method:: csvreader.__next__() Return the next row of the reader's iterable object as a list (if the object was returned from :func:`reader`) or a dict (if it is a :class:`DictReader` instance), parsed according to the current :class:`Dialect`. Usually you should call this as ``next(reader)``.
Reader objects have the following public attributes:
.. attribute:: csvreader.dialect A read-only description of the dialect in use by the parser.
.. attribute:: csvreader.line_num The number of lines read from the source iterator. This is not the same as the number of records returned, as records can span multiple lines.
DictReader objects have the following public attribute:
.. attribute:: DictReader.fieldnames If not passed as a parameter when creating the object, this attribute is initialized upon first access or when the first record is read from the file.
:class:`writer` objects (:class:`DictWriter` instances and objects returned by the :func:`writer` function) have the following public methods. A row must be an iterable of strings or numbers for :class:`writer` objects and a dictionary mapping fieldnames to strings or numbers (by passing them through :func:`str` first) for :class:`DictWriter` objects. Note that complex numbers are written out surrounded by parens. This may cause some problems for other programs which read CSV files (assuming they support complex numbers at all).
.. method:: csvwriter.writerow(row)
Write the *row* parameter to the writer's file object, formatted according
to the current :class:`Dialect`. Return the return value of the call to the
*write* method of the underlying file object.
.. versionchanged:: 3.5
Added support of arbitrary iterables.
.. method:: csvwriter.writerows(rows) Write all elements in *rows* (an iterable of *row* objects as described above) to the writer's file object, formatted according to the current dialect.
Writer objects have the following public attribute:
.. attribute:: csvwriter.dialect A read-only description of the dialect in use by the writer.
DictWriter objects have the following public method:
.. method:: DictWriter.writeheader()
Write a row with the field names (as specified in the constructor) to
the writer's file object, formatted according to the current dialect. Return
the return value of the :meth:`csvwriter.writerow` call used internally.
.. versionadded:: 3.2
.. versionchanged:: 3.8
:meth:`writeheader` now also returns the value returned by
the :meth:`csvwriter.writerow` method it uses internally.
The simplest example of reading a CSV file:
import csv
with open('some.csv', newline='') as f:
reader = csv.reader(f)
for row in reader:
print(row)
Reading a file with an alternate format:
import csv
with open('passwd', newline='') as f:
reader = csv.reader(f, delimiter=':', quoting=csv.QUOTE_NONE)
for row in reader:
print(row)
The corresponding simplest possible writing example is:
import csv
with open('some.csv', 'w', newline='') as f:
writer = csv.writer(f)
writer.writerows(someiterable)
Since :func:`open` is used to open a CSV file for reading, the file
will by default be decoded into unicode using the system default
encoding (see :func:`locale.getencoding`). To decode a file
using a different encoding, use the encoding argument of open:
import csv
with open('some.csv', newline='', encoding='utf-8') as f:
reader = csv.reader(f)
for row in reader:
print(row)
The same applies to writing in something other than the system default encoding: specify the encoding argument when opening the output file.
Registering a new dialect:
import csv
csv.register_dialect('unixpwd', delimiter=':', quoting=csv.QUOTE_NONE)
with open('passwd', newline='') as f:
reader = csv.reader(f, 'unixpwd')
A slightly more advanced use of the reader --- catching and reporting errors:
import csv, sys
filename = 'some.csv'
with open(filename, newline='') as f:
reader = csv.reader(f)
try:
for row in reader:
print(row)
except csv.Error as e:
sys.exit('file {}, line {}: {}'.format(filename, reader.line_num, e))
And while the module doesn't directly support parsing strings, it can easily be done:
import csv
for row in csv.reader(['one,two,three']):
print(row)
Footnotes
| [1] | If newline='' is not specified, newlines embedded inside quoted fields
will not be interpreted correctly, and on platforms that use \r\n linendings
on write an extra \r will be added. It should always be safe to specify
newline='', since the csv module does its own
(:term:`universal <universal newlines>`) newline handling. |