Add capability to handle Path/LocalPath objects

ci/requirements-2.7.pip

@@ -2,3 +2,5 @@ blosc
 httplib2
 google-api-python-client == 1.2
 python-gflags == 2.0
+pathlib
+py

doc/source/conf.py

@@ -299,8 +299,9 @@
 intersphinx_mapping = {
     'statsmodels': ('http://statsmodels.sourceforge.net/devel/', None),
     'matplotlib': ('http://matplotlib.org/', None),
-    'python': ('http://docs.python.org/', None),
-    'numpy': ('http://docs.scipy.org/doc/numpy', None)
+    'python': ('http://docs.python.org/3', None),
+    'numpy': ('http://docs.scipy.org/doc/numpy', None),
+    'py': ('http://pylib.readthedocs.org/en/latest/', None)
 }
 import glob
 autosummary_generate = glob.glob("*.rst")

doc/source/io.rst

@@ -79,9 +79,10 @@ for some advanced strategies
 
 They can take a number of arguments:
 
-  - ``filepath_or_buffer``: Either a string path to a file, URL
+  - ``filepath_or_buffer``: Either a path to a file (a :class:`python:str`,
+    :class:`python:pathlib.Path`, or :class:`py:py._path.local.LocalPath`), URL
     (including http, ftp, and S3 locations), or any object with a ``read``
-    method (such as an open file or ``StringIO``).
+    method (such as an open file or :class:`~python:io.StringIO`).
   - ``sep`` or ``delimiter``: A delimiter / separator to split fields
     on. With ``sep=None``, ``read_csv`` will try to infer the delimiter
     automatically in some cases by "sniffing".

doc/source/whatsnew/v0.17.1.txt

@@ -23,6 +23,10 @@ Enhancements
 Other Enhancements
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 
+- :func:`~pandas.io.parsers.read_csv` and :func:`~pandas.io.parsers.read_table` now
+  also accept :class:`python:pathlib.Path`, or :class:`py:py._path.local.LocalPath`
+  for the ``filepath_or_buffer`` argument. (:issue:`11051`)
+
 .. _whatsnew_0171.api:
 
 API changes

pandas/io/common.py

@@ -5,10 +5,24 @@
 import zipfile
 from contextlib import contextmanager, closing
 
-from pandas.compat import StringIO, string_types, BytesIO
+from pandas.compat import StringIO, BytesIO, string_types, text_type
 from pandas import compat
 
 
+try:
+    import pathlib
+    _PATHLIB_INSTALLED = True
+except ImportError:
+    _PATHLIB_INSTALLED = False
+
+
+try:
+    from py.path import local as LocalPath
+    _PY_PATH_INSTALLED = True
+except:
+    _PY_PATH_INSTALLED = False
+
+
 if compat.PY3:
     from urllib.request import urlopen, pathname2url
     _urlopen = urlopen
@@ -201,6 +215,25 @@ def _validate_header_arg(header):
                         "header=int or list-like of ints to specify "
                         "the row(s) making up the column names")
 
+def _stringify_path(filepath_or_buffer):
+    """Return the argument coerced to a string if it was a pathlib.Path
+       or a py.path.local
+
+    Parameters
+    ----------
+    filepath_or_buffer : object to be converted
+
+    Returns
+    -------
+    str_filepath_or_buffer : a the string version of the input path
+    """
+    if _PATHLIB_INSTALLED and isinstance(filepath_or_buffer, pathlib.Path):
+        return text_type(filepath_or_buffer)
+    if _PY_PATH_INSTALLED and isinstance(filepath_or_buffer, LocalPath):
+        return filepath_or_buffer.strpath
+    return filepath_or_buffer
+
+
 def get_filepath_or_buffer(filepath_or_buffer, encoding=None,
                            compression=None):
     """
@@ -209,7 +242,8 @@ def get_filepath_or_buffer(filepath_or_buffer, encoding=None,
 
     Parameters
     ----------
-    filepath_or_buffer : a url, filepath, or buffer
+    filepath_or_buffer : a url, filepath (str, py.path.local or pathlib.Path),
+                         or buffer
     encoding : the encoding to use to decode py3 bytes, default is 'utf-8'
 
     Returns
@@ -257,6 +291,8 @@ def get_filepath_or_buffer(filepath_or_buffer, encoding=None,
             filepath_or_buffer = k
         return filepath_or_buffer, None, compression
 
+    # It is a pathlib.Path/py.path.local or string
+    filepath_or_buffer = _stringify_path(filepath_or_buffer)
     return _expand_user(filepath_or_buffer), None, compression
 
 

pandas/io/tests/test_common.py

@@ -5,10 +5,20 @@
 import os
 from os.path import isabs
 
+import nose
 import pandas.util.testing as tm
 
 from pandas.io import common
 
+try:
+    from pathlib import Path
+except ImportError:
+    pass
+
+try:
+    from py.path import local as LocalPath
+except ImportError:
+    pass
 
 class TestCommonIOCapabilities(tm.TestCase):
 
@@ -27,6 +37,22 @@ def test_expand_user_normal_path(self):
         self.assertEqual(expanded_name, filename)
         self.assertEqual(os.path.expanduser(filename), expanded_name)
 
+    def test_stringify_path_pathlib(self):
+        tm._skip_if_no_pathlib()
+
+        rel_path = common._stringify_path(Path('.'))
+        self.assertEqual(rel_path, '.')
+        redundant_path = common._stringify_path(Path('foo//bar'))
+        self.assertEqual(redundant_path, 'foo/bar')
+
+    def test_stringify_path_localpath(self):
+        tm._skip_if_no_localpath()
+
+        path = 'foo/bar'
+        abs_path = os.path.abspath(path)
+        lpath = LocalPath(path)
+        self.assertEqual(common._stringify_path(lpath), abs_path)
+
     def test_get_filepath_or_buffer_with_path(self):
         filename = '~/sometest'
         filepath_or_buffer, _, _ = common.get_filepath_or_buffer(filename)

pandas/util/testing.py

@@ -255,6 +255,23 @@ def _skip_if_python26():
         import nose
         raise nose.SkipTest("skipping on python2.6")
 
+
+def _skip_if_no_pathlib():
+    try:
+        from pathlib import Path
+    except ImportError:
+        import nose
+        raise nose.SkipTest("pathlib not available")
+
+
+def _skip_if_no_localpath():
+    try:
+        from py.path import local as LocalPath
+    except ImportError:
+        import nose
+        raise nose.SkipTest("py.path not installed")
+
+
 def _incompat_bottleneck_version(method):
     """ skip if we have bottleneck installed
     and its >= 1.0