Reading Files Line by Line in Python

Reading a complete text file with read() is useful, but many files contain separate records that are easier to handle one at a time. This focused Block shows you how to loop directly over an opened file, clean each line, and process it while the file is open.

What you will learn:

• Choose between read() and direct file iteration
• Loop over a text file with for
• Understand why file lines often end with \n
• Use rstrip("\n") or strip() when cleaning a line
• Process independent records without storing the entire file as one string
• Keep file processing inside the with block

Finish by filtering useful records from a line-based text file.