From: David Morton <mortonda@...>
Date: 2008-01-24T04:49:26+09:00
Subject: Re: How to improve this code?

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On Jan 23, 2008, at 1:21 PM, 7stud -- wrote:

> David Morton wrote:
>>>
>>> In particular, the csv module is so inefficient, James Gray wrote  
>>> his
>>> own module and called it fastercsv.
>>
>> Most of the time, it's better to look for standard libraries or at
>> least good third party libraries rather than re-inventing the wheel
>> though.   Most of the time, when one re-invents the wheel, one gets  
>> it
>> wrong.
>>
>
> Looking for a standard library module so that you can split a string  
> on
> a comma is a ridiculous waste of time.   At some point, you actually
> have to be able to program something.



If you think parsing a CSV file is as simple as splitting on a comma,  
you need to think again.

Look up RFC 4180.   It's not a hard format, but it *is* more than just  
"foo,bar".split(',').

It's enough code that I'd rather use an existing library than to waste  
a ridiculous amount of time doing it (correctly) myself.


David Morton
Maia Mailguard http://www.maiamailguard.com
mortonda@dgrmm.net



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