Can anyone explain this error? AttributeError: 'list' object has no attribute 'encode'

Question

From the research I've been doing, this code should write text into a CSV file.

import csv
name = "X"
score = "Y"
with open('some.csv', 'wb') as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    data = [["Name", "Score"],
            [name,score]]
    f.write(data[0].encode('utf-8'))        
    writer.writerows(data)

At first, it threw me an encoding error. After hunting around on Stack Overflow, I found something about needing to encode the text into UTF8. So I tried encoding with X.encode(). Then I got this:

f.write(data[0].encode('utf-8'))
AttributeError: 'list' object has no attribute 'encode'

I can't find an answer as to why this is happening. Can anyone explain why I'm getting this error?

data[0] is ["Name", "Score"] not a string.

Malik Brahimi
– Malik Brahimi

2015-04-22 19:11:21 +00:00
Commented Apr 22, 2015 at 19:11 — Malik Brahimi
– Malik Brahimi, Commented Apr 22, 2015 at 19:11

Mark Tolonen · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-23 02:16:37Z

2

Use the csv writer you created. Don't write f directly. Drop the f.write line:

import csv
name = "X"
score = "Y"
with open('some.csv', 'wb') as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    data = [["Name", "Score"],
            [name,score]]
    writer.writerows(data)

Content of some.csv:

Name,Score
X,Y

Note this is assuming Python 2. If you are actually on Python 3, and are writing non-ASCII characters, the open has different parameters.

#coding:utf8
import csv
name = "马克"
score = "Y"
with open('some.csv', 'w', encoding='utf8', newline='') as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    data = [["Name", "Score"],
            [name,score]]
    writer.writerows(data)

edited Apr 23, 2015 at 2:16

answered Apr 23, 2015 at 2:09

Mark Tolonen

181k26 gold badges183 silver badges279 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

2 Comments

Roughbladez Over a year ago

Thanks for the answer. I got another question: Let's say the name and score variables were user input ie. input(). How would I write the name and score variable then move down a cell and repeat? I thought it was the newline but that seems to do something else.

Mark Tolonen Over a year ago

writerows takes a list of lists as above. writerow takes a single list of the elements in the row. So you'd just say writer.writerow([name,score]) for each row you want to add. the csv.writer takes care of adding the delimiters and the newlines.

Josh B. · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-22 20:08:35Z

The reason that you are getting that error is because you are trying to encode a list, not a string.

I made a working code that wrote "Name" in a .csv file with this script.

import csv
name = "X"
score = "Y"
with open('some.csv', 'wb') as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    data = [["Name", "Score"],
            [name,score]]
    f.write(data[0][0].encode('utf-8'))  #<-- Change made here
    #Removed line here

On the line that I changed, I added an extra [0]. You data list is nested, which means that there is more than one list inside of it.

If you want to get the "Name" string, you need to reference data[0][0]. This gets the first element in the outer list, with is ["Name", "Score"]. The next [0] gets the first element is that list, which is "Name".

I got rid of the line with writer.writerows(data). It was throwing me an error and I had no idea what it was supposed to do.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Can anyone explain this error? AttributeError: 'list' object has no attribute 'encode'

2 Answers 2

2 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

2 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related