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How can I take the string of names and preferences & add them to the dictionary with names as the key?

My code as it is right now looks like this:
def read_in_movie_preference():
"""Read the move data, and return a
preference dictionary."""
preference = {}
movies = []
# write code here:
file_location="./data/"
f = open(file_location+"preference.csv","r")
df = f.readlines()
#names as keys and prefrences
for line in df:
name = line[1].strip("\n").split(",")
prefs = line[2:].strip("\n").split(",")
preference[line[1]] = line[2:]
#print(test)
#movie names`
movietitles = df[0].strip("\n").split(",")
for movie in movietitles:
movie=movie.rstrip()
#can't seem to get rid of the spaces at the end
movies+=movietitles[2:]
print(movies)
return [movies, preference]
I cant seem to get the movie titles into the list without spaces at the end of some of them & I also cant add the names and preferences into the dictionary... I am supposed to do this task with basic python and no pandas .. very stuck would appreciate any help!
the dictionary would have names as keys and the preference numbers in number format instead of strings so it would theoretically look like this:
key: pref:
dennis, 0 1 0 1 0 ect
[![enter image description here][1]][1]this is what the data set looks like
here is the data pasted:

So the issue here is that you are using rstrip on a copy of the data but never apply it to the original.
The issue
for movie in movietitles:
movie=movie.rstrip() # Changes the (copy) of the data rather than the original
# We still need to apply this back to movietitles
There are a couple ways to fix this!
# Using indexing
for _ in range(len(movietitles)):
movietitles[_] = movietitles[_].rstrip()
Or we can do this inline with list comprehension
# Using list comprehension
movietitles = [movie.rstrip() for movie in movietitles]
As stated in the other answer, when working with csv data it's recomended to use a csv parser, but completely unnecessary for this scale! Hope this helps

My CSV files are not being assigned to the correct Key in a dictionary

def read_prices(tikrList):
#read each file and get the price list dictionary
def getPriceDict():
priceDict = {}
TLL = len(tikrList)
for x in range(0,TLL):
with open(tikrList[x] + '.csv','r') as csvFile:
csvReader = csv.reader(csvFile)
for column in csvReader:
priceDict[column[0]] = float(column[1])
return priceDict
#populate the final dictionary with the price dictionary from the previous function
def popDict():
combDict = {}
TLL = len(tikrList)
for x in range(0,TLL):
for y in tikrList:
combDict[y] = getPriceDict()
return combDict
return(popDict())
print(read_prices(['GOOG','XOM','FB']))
What is wrong with the code is that when I return the final dictionary the key for GOOG,XOM,FB is represnting the values for the FB dictionary only.
As you can see with this output:
{'GOOG': {'2015-12-31': 104.660004, '2015-12-30': 106.220001},
'XOM': {'2015-12-31': 104.660004, '2015-12-30': 106.220001},
'FB': {'2015-12-31': 104.660004, '2015-12-30': 106.220001}
I have 3 different CSV files but all of them are just reading the CSV file for FB.
I want to apologize ahead of time if my code is not easy to read or doesn't make sense. I think there is an issue with storing the values and returning the priceDict in the getPriceDict function but I cant seem to figure it out.
Any help is appreciated, thank you!

Since this is classwork I won't provide a solution but I'll point a few things out.
You have defined three functions - two are defined inside the third. While structuring functions like that can make sense for some problems/solutions I don't see any benefit in your solution. It seems to make it more complicated.
The two inner functions don't have any parameters, you might want to refactor them so that when they are called you pass them the information they need. One advantage of a function is to encapsulate an idea/process into a self-contained code block that doesn't rely on resources external to itself. This makes it easy to test so you know that the function works and you can concentrate on other parts of the code.
This piece of your code doesn't make much sense - it never uses x from the outer loop:
...
for x in range(0,TLL):
for y in tikrList:
combDict[y] = getPriceDict()
When you iterate over a list the iteration will stop after the last item and it will iterate over the items themselves - no need to iterate over numbers to access the items: don't do for i in range(thelist): print(thelist[i])
>>> tikrList = ['GOOG','XOM','FB']
>>> for name in tikrList:
... print(name)
GOOG
XOM
FB
>>>
When you read through a tutorial or the documentation, don't just look at the examples - read and understand the text .

Parsing and arranging text in python

I'm having some trouble figuring out the best implementation
I have data in file in this format:
|serial #|machine_name|machine_owner|
If a machine_owner has multiple machines, I'd like the machines displayed in a comma separated list in the field. so that.
|1234|Fred Flinstone|mach1|
|5678|Barney Rubble|mach2|
|1313|Barney Rubble|mach3|
|3838|Barney Rubble|mach4|
|1212|Betty Rubble|mach5|
Looks like this:
|Fred Flinstone|mach1|
|Barney Rubble|mach2,mach3,mach4|
|Betty Rubble|mach5|
Any hints on how to approach this would be appreciated.

You can use dict as temporary container to group by name and then print it in desired format:
import re
s = """|1234|Fred Flinstone|mach1|
|5678|Barney Rubble|mach2|
|1313|Barney Rubble||mach3|
|3838|Barney Rubble||mach4|
|1212|Betty Rubble|mach5|"""
results = {}
for line in s.splitlines():
_, name, mach = re.split(r"\|+", line.strip("|"))
if name in results:
results[name].append(mach)
else:
results[name] = [mach]
for name, mach in results.items():
print(f"|{name}|{','.join(mach)}|")

You need to store all the machines names in a list. And every time you want to append a machine name, you run a function to make sure that the name is not already in the list, so that it will not put it again in the list.
After storing them in an array called data. Iterate over the names. And use this function:
data[i] .append( [ ] )
To add a list after each machine name stored in the i'th place.
Once your done, iterate over the names and find them in in the file, then append the owner.
All of this can be done in 2 steps.

Python Extracting Data from JSON without a label?

The API here: https://api.bitfinex.com/v2/tickers?symbols=ALL
does not have any labels and I want to extract all of the tBTCUSD, tLTCUSD etc.. Basically everything without numbers. Normally, i would extract this information if they are labeled so i can do something like:
data['name']
or something like that however this API does not have labels.. how can i get this info with python?

You can do it like this:
import requests
j = requests.get('https://api.bitfinex.com/v2/tickers?symbols=ALL').json()
mydict = {}
for i in j:
mydict[i[0]] = i[1:]
Or using dictionary comprehension:
mydict = {i[0]: i[1:] for i in j}
Then access it as:
mydict['tZRXETH']

I don't have access to Python right now, but it looks like they're organized in a superarray of several subarrays.
You should be able to extract everything (the superarray) as data, and then do a:
for array in data:
print array[0]
Not sure if this answers your question. Let me know!

Even if it doesn't have labels (or, more specifically, if it's not a JSON object) it's still a perfectly legal piece of JSON, since it's just some arrays contained within a parent array.
Assuming you can already get the text from the api, you can load it as a Python object using json.loads:
import json
data = json.loads(your_data_as_string)
Then, since the labels you want to extract are always in the first position of the arrays, you can store them in a list using a list comprehension:
labels = [x[0] for x in data]
labels will be:
['tBTCUSD', 'tLTCUSD', 'tLTCBTC', 'tETHUSD', 'tETHBTC', 'tETCBTC', ...]

Python text file searching for values and compiling results found

I have a large text file of lots of experimental results to search through for specific pieces of data, which I need to compile. The text file has results from many different experiments, and I need to keep the data from each experiment together.
e.g. (Not the actual data)
Object 1
The colour of the object is blue.
The size of the object is 0.5 m^3
The mass of the object is 0.8 g
Object 2
The colour of the object is pink.
The size of the object is 0.3m^3
etc.
I know where the values I want will be, as I can search the text for a specific phrase that I know will be present on the line the data is on.
One way I thought of doing it would be to search through the file for each specific line (I'm looking for two different variables), and add the value needed to a list. From this I would then create a dictionary for each object, assuming that at the same number in each list will be data from the same object.
e.g.
variable_one = []
variable_two = []
def get_data(file):
with open("filename.txt", "r") as file:
for line in file:
if "The colour" in line:
variable_one.append(line.split()[6])
if "The mass" in line:
variable_two.append(line.split()[6])
file.close()
or, to search through the file and create a list, with each entry being the section of data from a different object, then searching for the two variables for each object from within the different items in the list - again eventually storing the values from each object in a dictionary.
What I want to know is if there is a more efficient/better method for doing this than the ideas I had?

Here is an alternative which uses only one list and uses less "append" and less "in" and thus should be more effective.
variables = []
with open('filename.txt') as input:
colour = mass = ''
for line in input:
fields = line.split()
if len(fields)>6:
value = fields[6]
if 'The colour' in line:
colour = value
elif 'The mass' in line:
mass = value
elif line.startswith('Object'):
variables.append((colour, mass))
colour = mass = '' # may not be needed.
del(variables[0])

The way you are doing it there looks fine to me in general, except for the areas I mentioned in the comments, and the indexing causing an error if you have a line shorter than 6 words.