I want to be able to process data using a python script and write it to an external file which can be imported into a latex table environment.
The data is formatted exactly as it would be in the main .tex file (separated by &, with \\ at the end of each row), so i was hoping I would be able to just use the \input command to input it directly into the latex source when it compiles, but it comes up with a misplaced \noalign error and doesn't display the bottom rule of the table.
Below is a minimal worked example where \input is used, which creates the error - along with a counter-example, where the same data is written directly into the latex source which works fine:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{booktabs}
\begin{filecontents}{test.tab}
1 & 2 & 3 & 4\
5 & 6 & 7 & 8\
\end{filecontents}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[t]
\centering
\caption{Test table (input)}
\begin{tabular}{lrrr} \toprule
test 1 & test 2 & test 3 & test 4\ \midrule
%
\input{test.tab}
%
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\begin{table}[h!]
\centering
\caption{Test table (no input)}
\begin{tabular}{lrrr} \toprule
test 1 & test 2 & test 3 & test 4\ \midrule
%
1 & 2 & 3 & 4\
5 & 6 & 7 & 8\
%
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\end{document}
this produces:
Curiously enough, if I put the entire tabular environment into the file, and then use \input{test.tab} within the table environment tags, it works fine:
\begin{filecontents}{test.tab}
\begin{tabular}{lrrr} \toprule
test 1 & test 2 & test 3 & test 4\\ \midrule
%
1 & 2 & 3 & 4\\
5 & 6 & 7 & 8\\
%
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{filecontents}
but I would rather not do that, as I want to be able to edit the table itself easily, and don't want to have to re-generate all the data (or edit all of the files manually) every time I make a change.
Is there a simple way of inputting data directly into a table from an external file using the \input command (or something similar) like this? or do I have to use something like pgfplotstables to parse my data first?
