Can I automatically create a table in PostgreSQL from a csv file with headers?

Question

I\'m running PostgreSQL 9.2.6 on OS X 10.6.8. I would like to import data from a CSV file with column headers into a database. I can do this with the COPY state

Answer 1

There is a second approach, which I found here (from mmatt). Basically you call a function within Postgres (last argument specifies the number of columns).

select load_csv_file('myTable','C:/MyPath/MyFile.csv',24)

Here is mmatt's function code, which I had to modify slightly, because I am working on the public schema. (copy&paste into PgAdmin SQL Editor and run it to create the function)

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION load_csv_file(
    target_table text,
    csv_path text,
    col_count integer)
  RETURNS void AS
$BODY$

declare

iter integer; -- dummy integer to iterate columns with
col text; -- variable to keep the column name at each iteration
col_first text; -- first column name, e.g., top left corner on a csv file or spreadsheet

begin
    set schema 'public';

    create table temp_table ();

    -- add just enough number of columns
    for iter in 1..col_count
    loop
        execute format('alter table temp_table add column col_%s text;', iter);
    end loop;

    -- copy the data from csv file
    execute format('copy temp_table from %L with delimiter '','' quote ''"'' csv ', csv_path);

    iter := 1;
    col_first := (select col_1 from temp_table limit 1);

    -- update the column names based on the first row which has the column names
    for col in execute format('select unnest(string_to_array(trim(temp_table::text, ''()''), '','')) from temp_table where col_1 = %L', col_first)
    loop
        execute format('alter table temp_table rename column col_%s to %s', iter, col);
        iter := iter + 1;
    end loop;

    -- delete the columns row
    execute format('delete from temp_table where %s = %L', col_first, col_first);

    -- change the temp table name to the name given as parameter, if not blank
    if length(target_table) > 0 then
        execute format('alter table temp_table rename to %I', target_table);
    end if;

end;

$BODY$
  LANGUAGE plpgsql VOLATILE
  COST 100;
ALTER FUNCTION load_csv_file(text, text, integer)
  OWNER TO postgres;

Note: There is a common issue with importing text files related to encoding. The csv file should be in UTF-8 format. However, sometimes this is not quite achieved by the programs, which try to do the encoding. I have overcome this issue by opening the file in Notepad++ and converting it to ANSI and back to UTF8.