hledger/CSV.md

title
hledger How to read CSV files

How to read CSV files

Here's a quick example of converting a CSV file.

Say we have downloaded checking.csv from a bank for the first time:

"Date","Note","Amount"
"2012/3/22","DEPOSIT","50.00"
"2012/3/23","TRANSFER TO SAVINGS","-10.00"

We could create checking.csv.rules containing:

account1 assets:bank:checking
skip     1
fields   date, description, amount
currency $

if ~ SAVINGS
 account2 assets:bank:savings

This says: "always use assets🏦checking as the first account; ignore the first line; use the first, second and third CSV fields as the entry date, description and amount respectively; always prepend $ to the amount value; if the CSV record contains 'SAVINGS', use assets🏦savings as the second account". CSV files in the manual describes the syntax.

Now hledger can read this CSV file:

$ hledger -f checking.csv print
using conversion rules file checking.csv.rules
2012/03/22 DEPOSIT
    income:unknown             $-50.00
    assets:bank:checking        $50.00

2012/03/23 TRANSFER TO SAVINGS
    assets:bank:savings         $10.00
    assets:bank:checking       $-10.00

We might save this output as checking.journal, and/or merge it (manually) into the main journal file.