Convert commas decimal separators to dots within a Dataframe

Question

I am importing a CSV file like the one below, using pandas.read_csv:

df = pd.read_csv(Input, delimiter=";")

Example of CSV file:

10;01.02.2015 16:58;01.02.2015 16:58;-0.59;0.1;-4.39;NotApplicable;0.79;0.2
11;01.02.2015 16:58;01.02.2015 16:58;-0.57;0.2;-2.87;NotApplicable;0.79;0.21

The problem is that when I later on in my code try to use these values I get this error: TypeError: can't multiply sequence by non-int of type 'float'

The error is because the number I'm trying to use is not written with a dot (.) as a decimal separator but a comma(,). After manually changing the commas to a dots my program works.

I can't change the format of my input, and thus have to replace the commas in my DataFrame in order for my code to work, and I want python to do this without the need of doing it manually. Do you have any suggestions?

Answer 1

pandas.read_csv has a decimal parameter for this: doc

I.e. try with:

df = pd.read_csv(Input, delimiter=";", decimal=",")