Python-xlsxwriter only writes as a text when using csv data

Question

I am trying to create an excel file using python's xlsxwriter package. Currently I have all of the formatting done and all I need to do now is import the correct data. To do this I am using the csv package to read a csv/txt file. However when I read the data in from the csv and output it to the xlsx file all of the numbers/date/etc are fromatted as text. I believe this is because when I read the file in each data point is surround by single quotes (ex: '00082424'). This causes excel to read it as text (it even throws one of those little note errors saying it looks like a number preceded by a ') and as a result keeps the leading zeros. How can I read my data in from a csv and export it using xlsxwriter such that everything is not preceded by a '?

Here is an abridged version of the code I am using for the read-in and the output:

import csv
import xlsxwriter

""" Create a workbook and add worksheets """
workbook = xlsxwriter.Workbook('Test.xlsx')
worksheet1 = workbook.add_worksheet('Raw Data')

""" Read csv file """
with open("filename.txt") as filein:
    reader = csv.reader(filein, skipinitialspace = True)
    ind, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u = zip(*reader)


""" Start from the cell C5. Rows and columns are zero indexed """
row = 4
col = 2

money_format = workbook.add_format({'num_format': '$#,##0'})

for d_dat in list(p):
    worksheet1.write(row, col, d_dat, money_format)
    row +=1

row = 4

Answer 1

By default XlsxWriter writes Python string data as Excel strings.

However, for cases like this, when reading from csv or text files where the data is always strings then there is a constructor option to convert numeric strings to Excel numbers:

workbook = xlsxwriter.Workbook('Test.xlsx', {'strings_to_numbers': True})

See the XlsxWriter constructor and write() docs for more details.