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Additional documentation
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ccrook committed Apr 18, 2013
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65 changes: 64 additions & 1 deletion resources/context_help/QgsDelimitedTextSourceSelect-en_US
Expand Up @@ -125,7 +125,22 @@ entering it twice. For example if ' is a quote character and an escape characte
<h4><a name="regexp">How regular expression delimiters work</a></h4>
<p>Regular expressions are mini-language used to represent character patterns. There are many variations
of regular expression syntax - QGis uses the syntax provided by the <a href="http://qt-project.org/doc/qt-4.8/qregexp.html">QRegExp</a> class of the <a href="http://qt.digia.com">Qt</a> framework.</p>
<p>In a regular expression delimited file each line is treated as a record. Each match of the regular expression in the line is treated as the end of a field.</p>
<p>In a regular expression delimited file each line is treated as a record. Each match of the regular expression in the line is treated as the end of a field. If the regular expression contains capture groups
then these are extracted as fields. </p>
<p>The regular expression is treated slightly differently if it is anchored to the start of the line (that is, the pattern starts with &quot;^&quot;.
In this case the regular expression is matched against each line. If the line does not match it is discarded
as an invalid record. Each capture group in the expression is treated as a field. The regular expression
is invalid if it does not have capture groups. As an example this can be used as a (somewhat
unintuitive) means of loading data with fixed width fields. For example if the data has fields of 5
characters, 10 characters, and 2 fields of 20 characters, then this can be loaded with a regular
expression such as
<pre>
^(.{5})(.{10})(.{20})(.{20}).*
</pre>
<p>
(If the records are possibly not completely filled then the counts could be entered as {,5}, meaning
up to 5 characters, so that the regular expression will not fail).
</p>

<h4><a name="wkt">How WKT text is interpreted</a></h4>
<p>
Expand Down Expand Up @@ -172,3 +187,51 @@ id|wkt<br />
</ul>

<h4><a name="python">Using delimited text layers in Python</a></h4>
<p>Delimited text data sources can be creating from Python in a similar way to other vector layers.
The pattern is:
</p>
<pre>
from PyQt4.QtCore import QUrl, QString<br />
from qgis.core import QgsVectorLayer, QgsMapLayerRegistry<br />
<br />
# Define the data source<br />
filename="test.csv"<br />
uri=QUrl.fromLocalFile(filename)<br />
uri.addQueryItem("type","csv")<br />
uri.addQueryItem("delimiter","|")<br />
# ... other delimited text parameters<br />
layer=QgsVectorLayer(QString(uri.toEncoded()),"Test CSV layer","delimitedtext")<br />
# Add the layer to the map<br />
if layer.isValid():<br />
QgsMapLayerRegistry.instance().addMapLayer( layer )<br />
</pre>
<p>The configuration of the delimited text layer is defined by adding query items to the uri.
The following options can be added
</p>
<ul>
<li><i>encoding=..</i> defines the file encoding. The default is &quot;UTF-8&quot;</li>
<li><i>type=(csv|regexp|whitespace)</i>< defines the delimiter type. Valid values are csv,
regexp, and whitespace (which is just a special case of regexp). Default is csv.</li>
<li><i>delimiter=...</i> defines the delimiters that will be used for csv formatted files,
or the regular expression for regexp formatted files. Default is , for CSV files. There is
no default for regexp files.</li>
<li><i>quote=..</i> (for csv files) defines the characters used to quote fields. Default is &quot;</li>
<li><i>escape=..</i> (for csv files) defines the characters used to escape the special meaning of the next character. Default is &quot;</li>
<li><i>skipLines=#</i> defines the number of lines to discard from the beginning of the file. Default is 0.</li>
<li><i>useHeader=(yes|no)</i> defines whether the first data record contains the names of the data fields. Default is yes.</li>
<li><i>trimFields=(yes|no)</i> defines whether leading and trailing whitespace is to be removed from unquoted fields. Default is no.</li>
<li><i>maxFields=#</i> defines the maximum number of fields that will be loaded from the file.
Additional fields in each record will be discarded. Default is 0 - display all fields.
(This option is not available from the delimited text layer dialog box).</li>
<li><i>skipEmptyFields=(yes|no)</i> defines whether empty unquoted fields will be discarded if they are empty (applied after trimFields). Default is no.</li>
<li><i>decimalPoint=.</i> specifies an alternative character that may be used as a decimal point in numeric fields. Default is a point (full stop) character.</li>
<li><i>wktField=fieldname</i> specifies the name or number (starting at 1) of the field containing a well known text geometry definition</li>
<li><i>xField=fieldname</i> specifies the name or number (starting at 1) of the field the X coordinate (only applies if wktField is not defined)</li>
<li><i>yField=fieldname</i> specifies the name or number (starting at 1) of the field the Y coordinate (only applies if wktField is not defined)</li>
<li><i>geomType=(auto|point|line|polygon|none)</i> specifies type of geometry for wkt fields, or none to load the file as an attribute-only table. Default is auto.</li>
<li><i>crs=...</i> specifies the coordinate system to use for the vector layer, in a format accepted by QgsCoordinateReferenceSystem.createFromString (for example &quot;EPSG:4167&quot;). If this is not
specified then a dialog box may request this information from the user.</li>
<li><i>quiet=(yes|no)</i> specifies whether errors encountered loading the layer are presented in a dialog box (they will be written to the QGis log in any case). Default is no.</li>
</ul>


33 changes: 18 additions & 15 deletions src/core/qgsvectorlayer.h
Expand Up @@ -310,15 +310,6 @@ struct CORE_EXPORT QgsVectorJoinInfo
*
* Defines the characters used to escape delimiter, quote, and newline characters.
*
* - skipEmptyFields=(yes|no)
*
* If yes then empty fields will be discarded (eqivalent to concatenating consecutive
* delimiters)
*
* - trimFields=(yes|no)
*
* If yes then leading and trailing whitespace will be removed from fields
*
* - skipLines=n
*
* Defines the number of lines to ignore at the beginning of the file (default 0)
Expand All @@ -328,17 +319,31 @@ struct CORE_EXPORT QgsVectorJoinInfo
* Defines whether the first record in the file (after skipped lines) contains
* column names (default yes)
*
* - xField=column yField=column
* - trimFields=(yes|no)
*
* Defines the name of the columns holding the x and y coordinates for XY point geometries.
* If the useHeader is no (ie there are no column names), then this is the column
* number (with the first column as 1).
* If yes then leading and trailing whitespace will be removed from fields
*
* - skipEmptyFields=(yes|no)
*
* If yes then empty fields will be discarded (eqivalent to concatenating consecutive
* delimiters)
*
* - maxFields=#
*
* Specifies the maximum number of fields to load for each record. Additional
* fields will be discarded. Default is 0 - load all fields.
*
* - decimalPoint=c
*
* Defines a character that is used as a decimal point in the numeric columns
* The default is '.'.
*
* - xField=column yField=column
*
* Defines the name of the columns holding the x and y coordinates for XY point geometries.
* If the useHeader is no (ie there are no column names), then this is the column
* number (with the first column as 1).
*
* - xyDms=(yes|no)
*
* If yes then the X and Y coordinates are interpreted as
Expand Down Expand Up @@ -383,8 +388,6 @@ struct CORE_EXPORT QgsVectorJoinInfo
*
* Provider to display vector data in a GRASS GIS layer.
*
*
*
*/


Expand Down
6 changes: 6 additions & 0 deletions src/providers/delimitedtext/qgsdelimitedtextfile.cpp
Expand Up @@ -151,6 +151,12 @@ bool QgsDelimitedTextFile::setFromUrl( QUrl &url )
quote = "'\"";
escape = "";
}
else if( type == "regexp ")
{
delimiter="";
quote="";
escape="";
}
}
if ( url.hasQueryItem( "delimiter" ) )
{
Expand Down

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