Tably

Python script for converting .csv data to LaTeX tables.

Features

• easy to use - just provide a .csv file
• escapes commonly used special LaTeX characters, such as $, &, %, etc.
• user-defined separators - comma, tab, semicolon, etc.
• units for each column can be specified
• possible to define table caption and label
• columns' alignments can be customized
• can be used on multiple .csv files at the same time
• table can be added to the existing .tex file

Requirements

Python 3.4+

It uses booktabs package for creating the tables (nicer looking tables than the default tabular), which is included in TeXLive distribution and should be automatically installed in MiKTeX distribution.

Installation

For a test run all you need to do is download the file tably.py and put it in the directory where you would like to use it and run it by typing:

$ python tably.py filename.csv [arguments]

If you wish to use it repeatedly, a good idea would be to make it executable and add it to your $PATH, which simplifies usage and makes it possible to use it in any directory:

$ tably filename.csv [arguments]

Usage

See the folder examples for the input files used in the following examples.

The most basic example:

$ tably examples/example1.csv

outputs to console:

% \usepackage{booktabs} % move this to preamble and uncomment

\begin{table}[htb]
    \centering
    \begin{tabular}{@{}cccc@{}}
        \toprule
        Name & Qty & Price per kg & Price \\
        \midrule
        Apples & 10.2 & 5 & 51.0 \\
        Bananas & 7.3 & 11 & 80.3 \\
        Cherries & 5.7 & 30 & 171.0 \\
        Dates & 3.5 & 90 & 315.0 \\
        Eggs & 6.4 & 2 & 12.8 \\
        \bottomrule
    \end{tabular}
\end{table}

which is ready to be copied to your existing LaTeX document.

If you want the output to be appended to your existing .tex file, use the option -o filename.tex.
If you want to create a new file, you probably want to include a preamble too (so the new .tex document is ready to be build as .pdf), which can be done by passing the -p option (along with specifying outfile as above).

All options can be seen by using -h or --help:

$ tably -h

usage: tably [-h] [-a ALIGN] [-c CAPTION] [-i] [-k SKIP] [-l LABEL] [-n]
             [-o OUTFILE] [-p] [-s SEP] [-u UNITS [UNITS ...]]
             files [files ...]

Creates LaTeX tables from .csv files

positional arguments:
  files                 .csv file(s) containing the data you want to export.

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -a ALIGN, --align ALIGN
                        Alignment for the columns of the table. Use `l`, `c`,
                        and `r` for left, center and right. Either one
                        character for all columns, or one character per
                        column. Default: c
  -c CAPTION, --caption CAPTION
                        Caption of the table. Default: None
  -i, --no-indent       Pass this if you do not want to indent LaTeX source
                        code with 4 spaces per float. No difference in the
                        final result (pdf). Default: False
  -k SKIP, --skip SKIP  Number of rows in .csv to skip. Default: 0
  -l LABEL, --label LABEL
                        Label of the table, for referencing it. Default: None
  -n, --no-header       By default, the first row of .csv is used as a table
                        header. Pass this option if there is no header.
                        Default: False
  -o OUTFILE, --outfile OUTFILE
                        Choose an output file to save the results. The results
                        are appended to the file (added after the last line).
                        Default: None, prints to console.
  -p, --preamble        If selected, makes a whole .tex document (including
                        the preamble) ready to be built as .pdf. Useful when
                        trying to make a quick report. Default: False
  -s SEP, --sep SEP     Choose a separator between columns. If a file is tab-
                        separated, pass `t` or `tab`. If a file is semicolon-
                        separated, pass `s`, `semi` or `\;`.Default: `,`
                        (comma-separated)
  -u UNITS [UNITS ...], --units UNITS [UNITS ...]
                        Provide units for each column. If column has no unit,
                        denote it by passing either `-`, `/` or `0`. If `--no-
                        header` is used, this argument is ignored.

---

More complex examples:

$ tably examples/example1.csv -o examples/table1.tex -p -a lrcr -u / kg $ $ -l tab:ex1 -c "Prices of breakfasts"

Saves the output (-o) to examples/table1.tex file, containing a preamble (-p), alignment of the columns (-a) in the table is left-right-center-right (lrcr), units (-u) for each column are provided (/ represents no unit, same as 0 and -), table label (-l) is tab:ex1 and the caption (-c) is Prices of breakfasts. The final result is at examples/table1.pdf.

---

$ tably examples/example2.csv -o examples/table2.tex -p -a r -n -k 3

Here the alignment for a whole table is right (-a r), there is no header (-n) and we skip first three rows of .csv file (-k 3). The final result is at examples/table2.pdf.

FAQ

There are online tools which can do the same stuff. Why would I use tably?

Imagine yourself being stranded on a desert island with you laptop, but without internet, and you need to convert all those .csv's to .pdf before you can be rescued...

Can I pass multiple .csv files all at once?

You can, and this is best used if the data in all those .csv files is similar - same number of columns, same data types (so you can use the same alignment for all tables), etc. Like multiple outputs of a same software/machine/procedure.

If your .csv files are different, it might be easier to call tably multiple times, one .csv file per call.

I found a bug and/or have feature request, how can I contact you?

Please use this project's issue tracker. If you found a bug, please be as detailed as possible to make it easier for me to be able to reproduce it and fix it.

License

MIT license