streamCSV

v0.0.2

Read a CSV or TSV file line-by-line, applying headers to each row and guessing the correct type for each entry. Convenient for very large files.

##Installation

npm install node-stream-csv

How to use

streamCSV takes three arguments: A filename, a callback for each row, and a callback when it's done. The last is optional.

Examples

These are all examples from test/test.js

var streamCSV = require("node-stream-csv");

streamCSV("state_population.tsv", function(state) {
	console.log(state);
});

/* Input

SUMLEV	REGION	DIVISION	STATE	NAME	POPESTIMATE2013	POPEST18PLUS2013	PCNT_POPEST18PLUS
10	0	0	0	United States	316128839	242542967	76.7
40	3	6	1	Alabama	4833722	3722241	77
40	4	9	2	Alaska	735132	547000	74.4
*/

/* Output:
{ SUMLEV: 10,
  REGION: 0,
  DIVISION: 0,
  STATE: 0,
  NAME: 'United States',
  POPESTIMATE2013: 316128839,
  POPEST18PLUS2013: 242542967,
  PCNT_POPEST18PLUS: 76.7 }
{ SUMLEV: 40,
  REGION: 3,
  DIVISION: 6,
  STATE: 1,
  NAME: 'Alabama',
  POPESTIMATE2013: 4833722,
  POPEST18PLUS2013: 3722241,
  PCNT_POPEST18PLUS: 77 }
{ SUMLEV: 40,
  REGION: 4,
  DIVISION: 9,
  STATE: 2,
  NAME: 'Alaska',
  POPESTIMATE2013: 735132,
  POPEST18PLUS2013: 547000,
  PCNT_POPEST18PLUS: 74.4 }	  
*/

Note that the module correctly interpreted the numbers as numbers. If you don't want this behavior, such as when you've got leading zeroes you want to preserve, pass an options object to the first argument with dontguess:

streamCSV(
	{
		filename: "county_population.csv",
		dontguess: true
	},
	function(datum, c) {
		process.stdout.write("Read " + c + " lines from county file.\r");
	},
	function() { // on close 
		cb();
	}		
);

/* Output 
{ SUMLEV: '050',
  REGION: '3',
  DIVISION: '6',
  STATE: '01',
  COUNTY: '001',
  STNAME: 'Alabama',
  CTYNAME: 'Autauga County',
  CENSUS2010POP: '54571'
  // etc etc
}

##Options

• dontguess: No type guessing, just import every data point as a string. You can also pass a comma-separated list of fields not to guess on

• noheader: The first line is a regular line of data, not a set of headers. Just give me back arrays of each line.

• sparse: If there is a header but the field value is blank, don't include it in the object for that row

• mode: "csv" or "tsv". If unspecified, guesses from file extension.

##Dependencies

• This module uses d3's csv parser on each line.

• It uses a fork of maleck13's readline module to convert the filestream into line-by-line events. The fork allows for the fact that most readline modules, including the core module, often miss the last line of the file. The fork is distributed in this repo without the git files.