From: rpardee@...
Date: 2005-06-03T06:15:23+09:00
Subject: Re: Nuby problem w/CSV, tab-delimited files & embedded double-quotes

Woah--you are giving me the freak-out with that code. 8^)

I shouldn't have any escaped tabs--so that should suit.

Thanks!

-Roy

Ara.T.Howard@noaa.gov wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Jun 2005 rpardee@comcast.net wrote:
>
> > Hey All,
> >
> > I've got a file of tab-delimited data that I need to read in.  Up until
> > today this approach has worked wonderfully:
> >
> >   this_file = CSV.open(decrypted_file, "r", "\t")
> >   header = this_file.shift
> >   this_file.each do |line|
> >      # do stuff w/line here
> >   end
> >   this_file.close
> >
> > But today's file has an entry w/a pair of double-quotes around it.  So
> > now I get:
> >
> > c:/program files/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/CSV.rb:639:in `get_row':
> > CSV::IllegalFormatError (CSV::IllegalFormatError)
> > 	from c:/program files/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/CSV.rb:556:in `each'
> >
> > I've looked through the rubydocs on CSV & am not finding a method for
> > telling CSV to expect double-quotes in the file.  Is there such a
> > thing?
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> > -Roy
> >
> > P.S. I believe the following illustrates the problem--the "F" street
> > entry line does not seem to parse:
> >
> > require "CSV"        # Lib for working with comma-separated-values
> > files
> >
> > somedata = <<END_OF_FILE
> > userid	line1
> > 1-2700	1313 Mockingbird Lane
> > 2-2706	7100 58th Ave SE
> > 4-2718	128 S. "F" Street
> > 3-2712	45 600th Ave. NE
> > END_OF_FILE
> >
> > somedata.each_line do |l|
> >   x = CSV.parse_line(l, "\t")[0]
> >   puts x
> > end
> >
> > puts "Finished!"
>
> i think that, to be legitimate, this file would have to be
>
> > 4-2718	"128 S. ""F"" Street"
>
> so the data is corrupt and may need to be pre-munged.  if you file is always
> tab delimited why not
>
>    table = []
>    parse = proc{|line| line.split(%r/\t/).map{|c| c.strip}}
>    IO::readlines(decrypted_file){|line| table << parse[line]}
>    header = table.shift
>
> or do you sometimes have escaped tabs?
>
> cheers.
>
> -a
> --
> ===============================================================================
> | email :: ara [dot] t [dot] howard [at] noaa [dot] gov
> | phone :: 303.497.6469
> | My religion is very simple.  My religion is kindness.
> | --Tenzin Gyatso
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