Python CSV Has No Attribute 'Writer'

Question

There's a bit of code giving me trouble. It was working great in another script I had but I must have messed it up somehow.

The if csv: is primarily because I was relying on a -csv option in an argparser. But even if I were to run this with proper indents outside the if statement, it still returns the same error.

import csv

if csv:
    with open('output.csv', 'wb') as csvfile:
        csvout = csv.writer(csvfile, delimiter=',',
            quotechar=',', quoting=csv.QUOTE_MINIMAL)
        csvout.writerow(['A', 'B', 'C'])
        csvfile.close()

Gives me:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "import csv.py", line 34, in <module>
    csvout = csv.writer(csvfile, delimiter=',',
AttributeError: 'str' object has no attribute 'writer'

If I remove the if statement, I get:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\import csv.py", line 34, in <module>
    csvout = csv.writer(csvfile, delimiter=',',
AttributeError: 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'writer'

What silly thing am I doing wrong? I did try changing the file name to things like test.py as I saw that in another SO post, didn't work.

thameera · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-04 16:22:20Z

75

For me I had named my file csv.py. So when I import csv from that file I was essentially trying to import the same file itself.

answered Jul 4, 2014 at 16:22

thameera

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4 Comments

Raúl Over a year ago

same for me too :-)

Gregory Over a year ago

Same here ... (facepalm)

Astr-o Over a year ago

my face when ಥ_ಥ

minimalpop Over a year ago

facepalm-- @thameera thanks! changed my file to "not_csv.py" and now works perfectly :)

Jon Clements · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-05 23:10:56Z

16

If you've set something that assigns to csv (looks like a string) then you're shadowing the module import. So, the simplest thing is to just change whatever's assigning to csv that isn't the module and call it something else...

In effect what's happening is:

import csv
csv = 'bob'
csvout = csv.writer(somefile)

Remove the further assignment to csv and go from there...

answered Aug 5, 2013 at 23:10

Jon Clements

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1 Comment

Interrupt Over a year ago

You're right, I'm sorry for not seeing it sooner. I had a csv = args.csv elsewhere in the script. Thank you so much!! Changing the if statement to if args.csv and removing the previous csv = args.csv solved it. Excellent.

Kelvin Low · Accepted Answer · 2020-10-28 15:10:28Z

0

For my case, my function name happened to be csv(). Once I renamed my function, the error disappeared.

answered Oct 28, 2020 at 15:10

Kelvin Low

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