# How to use fastercsv to get rows as hashes?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-use-fastercsv-to-get-rows-as-hashes/153719>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [November 20, 2008, 1:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-use-fastercsv-to-get-rows-as-hashes/153719 "2008-11-20T13:42:16Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/sa125)\
**Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 1:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-use-fastercsv-to-get-rows-as-hashes/153719/1 "2008-11-20T13:42:16Z")

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Hi - I’m fairly new to ruby and trying to read a csv file using the  
fastercsv gem. I managed to read the rows arrays of data using:

require ‘fastercsv’

def read\_csv  
path\_to\_file = “/home/work/some\_file.csv”

# open the csv file to read

csv = FasterCSV.open(path\_to\_file, “r”)

# do stuff on rows as arrays

while row = csv.readline  
#… row will be [“cell1”, “cell2”, “cell3”, …]  
end  
end

What I’m trying to understand is how do I get the row as a hash where  
the keys are the column headers (so I don’t have to remember where each  
column sits in the array):

#…inside loop  
col1 = row[‘some column’]  
col2 = row[‘another column’]  
#…

I’m sure there’s a way to do this, but the RDoc wasn’t much help. I’d  
appreciate any tips - thanks!

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/sa125)\
**Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 3:01pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-use-fastercsv-to-get-rows-as-hashes/153719/2 "2008-11-20T15:01:33Z")

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On Nov 20, 2008, at 6:38 AM, sa 125 wrote:

> Hi - I’m fairly new to ruby

Hello and welcome.

> # do stuff on rows as arrays
> 
> while row = csv.readline  
> #… row will be [“cell1”, “cell2”, “cell3”, …]  
> end  
> end

Looking good. You can simplify it a bit if you like though:

def read\_csv(path = “/home/work/some\_file.csv”)  
FCSV.foreach(path) do |row|  
# …  
end  
end

foreach() is just a shortcut for open() and each(), which works like  
your while loop.

> What I’m trying to understand is how do I get the row as a hash where  
> the keys are the column headers (so I don’t have to remember where  
> each  
> column sits in the array):
> 
> #…inside loop  
> col1 = row[‘some column’]  
> col2 = row[‘another column’]  
> #…

The first step is to tell FasterCSV that the file has headers. You  
can do that by changing this line:

```
 FCSV.foreach(path) do |row|

```

to this:

```
 FCSV.foreach(path, :headers => true) do |row|

```

When you make that change, row will become a FasterCSV::Row object,  
instead of a normal Array. It has many features and will allow you to  
access columns by name exactly as you show above. If you really do  
want a Hash though, you can get it with a simple method call:

row\_hash = row.to\_hash

Hope that helps.

James Edward G. II

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@sa125](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/sa125)\
**Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 3:14pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-use-fastercsv-to-get-rows-as-hashes/153719/3 "2008-11-20T15:14:48Z")

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That’s exactly what I needed - many thanks!