Hi, you have plenty of good responses. I thought I would add one more:
def data_iter(file_name): data = file(file_name) while True: value = data.read(3) if not value: break yield value data.close() With the above, you can grab the entire data set (3 characters at a time) like so: data_set = [ d for d in data_iter('data') ] Or iterate over it: for d in data_iter('data'): # do stuff Enjoy! -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list