python read text file into array

Question

I am trying to use Python to auto-parse a set of text files and turn them into XML files.

There are alot of people asking how to loop through a text file and read them into an array. The trouble here is that this wont quite work for me.

I need to loop through the first three lines individually then drop the rest of the text file (body) into one array entry.

The text file is formatted as follows.

Headline

Subhead

by A Person

text file body content. Multiple paragraphs

How would I go about setting up an array to do this in Python?

Ashwini Chaudhary · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-31 21:44:51Z

2

Something like this:

with open("data1.txt") as f:
    head,sub,auth = [f.readline().strip() for i in range(3)]
    data=f.read()
    print head,sub,auth,data

If you've spaces between the the lines, then you should try:

filter() will remove he empty lines:

 with open("data1.txt") as f:
    head,sub,auth =filter(None,(f.readline().strip() for i in range(6)))
    data=f.read()
    print head,sub,auth,,data

edited Oct 31, 2012 at 21:44

answered Oct 31, 2012 at 21:33

Ashwini Chaudhary

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3 Comments

Ashwini Chaudhary Over a year ago

@enrico.bacis just strip() is fine.

greyoxide Over a year ago

Wonderful this did it. One more question how would I get the current path(where the text file lives) and append that to the bottom of the list?

Ashwini Chaudhary Over a year ago

@user1789778 if you're taking about the current working directory then try os.getcwd().

Jeff Gortmaker · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-31 21:35:11Z

If I understood your question correctly, you wish to put all the text except for the first 3 lines into an array (list). Here's how to do that:

with open("/path/to/your/file.txt") as f:
    all_lines = f.readlines()
content_lines = all_lines[3:]
content_text = '\n'.join(content_lines)
content_list.append(content_text)

Explanation: You first open the file, and then put all of its lines into a list. Then, you take all the lines after the first three, and put those into a list. Then, you join this new list with newlines to make it content again. Then, you append this new content to a list that you've created beforehand called content_list

If you want to put the first three lines into your list as well, then do the following before appending to content_list:

for line in all_lines[:3]:
    content_list.append(line)

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