Re: [Pythoncard-users] CSV for PythonCard

[Magnus L. H. <ml...@id...>]

From: "Kevin Altis" <al...@se...>

> >    Is CSV import / export something that needs to be solved now? Is it
> > required by something else?
>
> This issue came up because of the addresses and dbBrowser samples. A CSV
> module would allow simple import/export for any PythonCard app. It isn't
> critical right now, so anyone that wants to can pursue it and just add the
> module to cvs when it is ready and notify the list. I'm not actively
> pursuing it myself except via email.

Why not use XML? It's much more powerful, and there's _lots_ of support
for it in the standard libraries... You can even use the xmlrpclib for
simple serialisation:

>>> from xmlrpclib import dumps, loads
>>> params = ['foo', 'bar', 1.0, 2, {'baz':42}],
>>> string = dumps(params)
>>> print string
<params>
<param>
<value><array><data>
<value><string>foo</string></value>
<value><string>bar</string></value>
<value><double>1.0</double></value>
<value><int>2</int></value>
<value><struct>
<member>
<name>baz</name>
<value><int>42</int></value>
</member>
</struct></value>
</data></array></value>
</param>
</params>

>>> loads(string)[0][0]
['foo', 'bar', 1.0, 2, {'baz': 42}]

As an added bonus, you can now easily transfer PythonCard stacks via
xmlrpc -- even to apps written in other languages <wink>.

And for a simpler grammar, the (X)HTML table is quite nice for this sort of
thing. CVS is cute, but if you don't have to work with Excel etc. it may
not be the best technology to use... (And you could always use tab-separated
values, which is much simpler, and which is also supported by Excel etc.)

> ka

--

  Magnus Lie Hetland         http://www.hetland.org

 "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in
  it, doesn't go away."           -- Philip K. Dick