How to write information from a list to a csv file using csv DictWriter?

Question

Using the csv module , Ive been trying to pass / write information from a list to a csv file in pythonusing the dictwriter and im getting a strange e

Answer 1

writerow() function of the csv.DictWriter class expects the parameter as dict, whereas you are passing string to it. It is clearly mentioned in csv.DictWriter document which says:

Create an object which operates like a regular writer but maps dictionaries onto output rows. The fieldnames parameter is a sequence of keys that identify the order in which values in the dictionary passed to the writerow() method are written to the csvfile.

In order to make it work, pass the dict object (with the mapping between the csv headers and the corresponding column value). For example:

import csv

names = ['kisha' ,'smith'  , 'kishasmith@gmail.com', 40000  ,  '1-1-2029'   ,'janitor' ]
fieldnames2 = ['first' , 'last' , 'email' , 'salary' , 'DOB' , 'occupation']

# for creating the dictionary object mapping "names" and "fieldnames2"
my_names_dict = dict(zip(fieldnames2, names))

with open('/path/to/my_file.csv' , 'w')as employee_file:
     csvwriter = csv.DictWriter(employee_file , fieldnames = fieldnames2 , delimiter = ',')
     csvwriter.writeheader()
     csvwriter.writerow(my_names_dict)

Above code will create a file /path/to/my_file.csv with the content as:

first,last,email,salary,DOB,occupation
kisha,smith,kishasmith@gmail.com,40000,1-1-2029,janitor

Answer 2

In your code info should be a dictionary, from a list of dictionaries. It's currently a string...

Anyway, your dataset is more suited for a simple csv.writer

I've changed names to a list of lists, containing all the rows, changed DictWriter to writer. Then dropped writeheader for writerow with the title. Also used writerows on the list of lists for better speed (avoids a loop):

import csv

names = [ ['kisha' ,'smith'  , 'kishasmith@gmail.com', 40000  ,  '1-1-2029'   ,'janitor' ],
         # more employees here
          ]

with open('employees.csv' , 'w', newline="") as employee_file:
     fieldnames2 = ['first' , 'last' , 'email' , 'salary' , 'DOB' , 'occupation']
     csvwriter = csv.writer(employee_file , delimiter = ',')
     csvwriter.writerow(fieldnames2)
     csvwriter.writerows(names)

Also note that you need newline="" (python 3) or your csv file will have a blank line every other line on windows.