csv - CSV File Reading and Writing

(examples from Python LibRef)

Note

This version of the csv module doesn’t support Unicode input. Also, there are currently some issues regarding ASCII NUL characters. Accordingly, all input should be UTF-8 or printable ASCII to be safe. These restrictions will be removed in the future.

Read csv:

import csv
spamReader = csv.reader(open('eggs.csv'), delimiter=' ', quotechar='|')
for row in spamReader:
    print ', '.join(row)
# Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Baked Beans
# Spam, Lovely Spam, Wonderful Spam

Write csv:

import csv
spamWriter = csv.writer(open('eggs.csv', 'w'), delimiter=' ',
                        quotechar='|', quoting=QUOTE_MINIMAL)
spamWriter.writerow(['Spam'] * 5 + ['Baked Beans'])
spamWriter.writerow(['Spam', 'Lovely Spam', 'Wonderful Spam'])

Use sniffer to find out the type of particular csv:

csvfile = open("example.csv")
dialect = csv.Sniffer().sniff(csvfile.read(1024))
csvfile.seek(0)
reader = csv.reader(csvfile, dialect)
# ... process CSV file contents here ...