access file from desktop

[dragrid]

Hi All,

trying to learn python via web and books
I have Python 2.6.1 on a vista machine ......
Can someone advise me how to code pulling in an excel file from my desktop
I am going to try and write some code to sort on a certain string and parse the file
I know I need to convert the file in a CSV file


Thanks in advance

[bvdet]

You can read cells in an Excel file using win32com. However, I would suggest saving a CSV file and using Python module csv to read the CSV file and save the data in a form that is easy to parse. Following is a small part of a CSV file and example code using csv.DictReader().

"07 May 2008  10:55:27"
"Advance Bill of Material Report Page  1"
"Steel Grade ..................... A992"
"Member Type ..................... BEAMS"
 , , , , , Total
 Ln, Qty, Material, Length, Remarks, Weight
1,1, W30x191, 17- 3, ,3295
2, , , , , 
3,1, W30x173, 35- 0, ,6055
4, , , , , 
5,1, W30x99, 29- 3, ,2896
 
"07 May 2008  10:55:27"
"Advance Bill of Material Report Page  2"
"Steel Grade ..................... A992"
"Member Type ..................... BEAMS"
 , , , , , Total
 Ln, Qty, Material, Length, Remarks, Weight
1,1, W24x84, 21- 0, ,1764
2,1, W24x84, 19- 0, ,1596
3,1, W24x84, 17- 6, ,1470
4, , , , , 
5,1, W24x76, 37- 9, ,2869

import csv
 
f = open('example.csv')
 
labels = ['Ln', 'Qty', 'Material', 'Length', 'Remarks', 'Weight']
 
reader = csv.DictReader(f, labels)
 
readerDict = {}
 
for item in reader:
    try:
        if item['Ln'].startswith('Advance Bill of Material Report'):
            page = int(item['Ln'].split()[-1])
        else:
            line = int(item['Ln'])
            if item['Material'] != ' ':
                readerDict.setdefault(page, []).append(item)
    except:
        pass
 
pages = readerDict.keys()
 
for page in pages:
    print "\nPage", page
    for line in readerDict[page]:
        print '    ', ''.join([line[key].center(fw) \
                               for fw, key in [[4,'Ln'],
                                               [4,'Qty'],
                                               [20,'Material'],
                                               [12,'Length'],
                                               [12,'Weight'],
                                               [24,'Remarks']]])
 
f.close()

-BV

[dragrid]

Thanks BV for your reply

However as a newbie I am trying to grasp this dictionary concept - I need to work on it more but in the mean time - can you or someone else who sees this reply - put some comments around readerDict {} - looks like you are seeting up a dictionary variable , why and also comments around the for loops - I am loosing track through some stages of the 2 for loops

That should do it for this original request and will close afterwards


Thanks again
Dragrid