[Numpy-discussion] Possible roadmap addendum: building better text file readers

[Alan G Isaac]

On 2/27/2012 2:47 PM, Matthew Brett wrote:
> Maybe we can just agree it is an important option to have rather than
> an unimportant one,


It depends on what you mean by "option".

If you mean there should be conversion tools
from other formats to a specified supported
format, then I agree.

If you mean that the core reader should be cluttered
with attempts to handle various and ill-specified
formats, so that we end up with the kind of mess that
leads people to expect their "CSV file" to be correctly
parsed when they are using a non-comma delimiter,
then I disagree.

Cheers,
Alan Isaac