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Section 11.8 Glossary

Glossary Glossary

open.
You must open a file before you can read its contents.
close.
When you are done with a file, you should close it.
read.
Will read the entire contents of a file as a string. This is often used in an assignment statement so that a variable can reference the contents of the file.
readline.
Will read a single line from the file, up to and including the first instance of the newline character.
readlines.
Will read the entire contents of a file into a list where each line of the file is a string and is an element in the list.
write.
Will add characters to the end of a file that has been opened for writing.
csv.
An optional Python module that provides useful functions for interacting with data in the Comma Separated Value format.
Comma Separated Value.
A format that text files can have. Promises that the file contains alphanumeric values separate by single commas and organized into one row of data per line.
reader.
A function part of the csv module that creates an object for traversing csv file data.
writerow.
A function part of the csv module that takes a list of data, formats it in the appropriate csv format, and writes it to a data file.
writerows.
A function part of the csv module. Similar to writerow, but can write multiple rows of data at once if given a list of lists.
absolute file path.
The name of a file that includes a path to the file from the root directory of a file system. An absolute file path always starts with a /.
relative file path.
The name of a file that includes a path to the file from the current working directory of a program. An relative file path never starts with a /.
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