Reading a file in Python for text

Question

I am given

bus_stops0.txt    
01012,Victoria St,Hotel Grand Pacific
01013,Victoria St,St. Joseph's Ch
01019,Victoria St,Bras Basah Cplx

in a notepad and I have no idea how to open this file inside IDLE.

Also, I want to define

def read_data(filename):
    stops = [] 
    with open(filename,  'r') as f:
        for line in f:
            line = line[:-1]
            code, road_name, desc = line.split(',')
            stops.append(filename)
    return str(stops)

such that

read_data('bus_stops0.txt')

['01012,Victoria St,Hotel Grand Pacific', "01013,Victoria St,St. Joseph's Ch", '01019,Victoria St,Bras Basah Cplx']

Is my definition correct in the first place?

Answer 1

for desired output the definition is:

def read_data(filename):
   stops = []
   with open(filename,  'r') as f:
       for line in f:
           stops.append(line.replace('\n', ''))
   return str(stops)

Answer 2

Use the U flag for universal readlines mode.

def read_data(filename):
   stops = []
   with open(filename,  'rU') as f:
       for line in f:
           stops.append(line.strip())
   return stops

Alternately, you can simply return readlines if you want to preserve your newlines

def read_data(filename):
   with open(filename,  'rU') as f:
       return f.readlines()

Answer 3

If 'stops' are the third element for each file line and you want to use list comprehension:

def read_data(filename):
    with open(filename,  'r') as f:
        stops = [line.split(',')[-1] for line in f]
return str(stops)

Answer 4

If I understand you correctly, you need the output something like this

['01012,Victoria St,Hotel Grand Pacific', "01013,Victoria St,St. Joseph's Ch", '01019,Victoria St,Bras Basah Cplx']

If that would be the case then here is the code. Make sure file has read permission.

def read_data(filename):
    stops = []
    with open(filename,  'r') as fobj:
       for line in fobj:
           stops.append(line.strip())
    return stops