How to compare 2 files and generate a list of matches, get value error?

[Bridget Barker]

f = open("Desktop/MEME_IDS", "r")  #open file with list of terms to search for
patterns = {}  #create an open dictionary (this is a string)
while True:
	line = f.readline()  #read each line of file1, put into variable line
	if (line == ''):    #at the end of file, stop
		break
	patterns[line] = None  #put each line into a list with the key patterns

f = open("Desktop/genelistAFUA.txt", "r")  #open next file
while True:
	line = f.readline()  #read each line in, with break for end of file, as above
	if (line == ''):
		break
	col1, col2 = line.split("\t")  #split the file into 2 columns, that are separated by a tab, what I want to match is in col1, info i need is in col2
	if (col1 in patterns):   # if the value in col1 matches the patterns list above, then print col2
		print col2

#from A to parse sublist of genes i am interested in from full genelist
#format of file one is a simple list of single values, the second file has 2 columns, I am matching column 1 from the list from file 1.

#my error is :

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "Desktop/parsefile.py", line 14, in <module>
col1, col2 = line.split("\t" ) #split the file into 2 columns, separated by a tab
ValueError: need more than 1 value to unpack


Any thoughts?

[bvdet]

Please use code tags when posting code.

Instead of entering a while loop, iterate on the file object in a for loop. Example:

f = open("some_file")
for line in f:
    print line

Iteration will cease when the end of file is reached.

Back to your problem. Check the contents of the last value of line.

[Bridget Barker]

Thanks for your help. The program works if I take a few lines of the gigantor input file, beginning, middle or end, so i plan to just chop up the file, and go from there.

I had originally had the program as you suggested, but it didn't work. And now realizing that it was probably the stupid input file from the get go.

Also, wasn't sure how to to the code tags, my bad.

[bvdet]

Glad to help. A lot of first time posters miss the code tags. The posters that never get it are the ones that are annoying!

[Bridget Barker]

thanks, i mistook the [code] for needing to type [python] :)

Also, another friend suggested using strip (i think this is similar to chomp, which i had used in perl) and that has totally solved it- I also had to keep the more complicated while=True loops, it just didn't work otherwise, ?????