title: pandas read_csv on a *.dat file delimited with cedilla not splitting into columns in dataframe
body: <p>This is my first time working on pandas so pardon my ignorance.
  My requirement is to download a file from S3 onto Ec2 and put the dat file onto a dataframe. This is how my input file data looked </p>
  
  <pre><code>1Ç70Ç23929Ç4341Ç1111Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ012ÇFillerÇ
  1Ç75Ç45555Ç4324Ç2222Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011ÇFillerÇ
  1Ç76Ç23957Ç4334Ç3333Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011ÇFillerÇ
  1Ç72Ç47776Ç4344Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇABÇ014ÇFillerÇ
  1Ç73Ç88880Ç4354Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇCDÇ011ÇFillerÇ
  1Ç74Ç99991Ç4364Ç5555Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇEEÇ014ÇFillerÇ
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>As the data did not seem to have any encoding or so i decided to use the read_Csv with delimiter as cedilla and store in dataframe.</p>
  
  <pre><code>iFldDelim = 'Ç'
  tf = pandas.read_csv(itextfile, iFldDelim, nrows = 5,header=None)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But for some reason it is not recognizing the same and puts the data in one column. </p>
  
  <pre><code>                                        0
  0 1Ç70Ç23929Ç4341Ç1111Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ012ÇFi...
  1 1Ç75Ç45555Ç4324Ç2222Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011ÇFi...
  2 1Ç76Ç23957Ç4334Ç3333Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011ÇFi...
  3 1Ç72Ç47776Ç4344Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇABÇ014ÇFi...
  4 1Ç73Ç88880Ç4354Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇCDÇ011ÇFi...
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The file seems like ASCII and not encoded. I did try using the encoding as UTF-8 and UTF-16 and giving the Unicode value as delimiter that does not work.
  I also tried to hardcode the delimiter as 'F' instead of cedilla and run the code thinking the file itself might have some encryption/encoding. But that is not the case, i got my output delimited by 'F'.</p>
  
  <p>With delimiter as 'F'.</p>
  
  <pre><code>                                   0       1
  0 1Ç70Ç23929Ç4341Ç1111Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ012Ç  illerÇ
  1 1Ç75Ç45555Ç4324Ç2222Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011Ç  illerÇ
  2 1Ç76Ç23957Ç4334Ç3333Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇAAÇ011Ç  illerÇ
  3 1Ç72Ç47776Ç4344Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇABÇ014Ç  illerÇ
  4 1Ç73Ç88880Ç4354Ç4444Ç0Ç0Ç1ÇCDÇ011Ç  illerÇ
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The file i am loading is a huge one usually and this one runs for a long time. So i am not sure if i encode the file using codec to UTF-8 and then put in dataframe is a wise option.</p>
  
  <p>I tried to create a cedilla delimited file manually and when passed through the same command it worked all fine. I am not able to figure what is going wrong here. Is there a way to figure out if it is encoded?</p>
  
  <p>Any advise is greatly appreciated. </p>
  
  <p>Thanks,
  VB</p>
  
  <p>Adopting Edchum advise, i used the below,</p>
  
  <pre><code>#file location
  dataPath = "C:/Users/Documents/Pytest/"
  itextfile = join(dataPath,'sample.dat')
  
  fb = open(itextfile, 'r')
  data = fb.read() 
  print(data)
  tf=pandas.read_csv(StringIO(data), sep='Ã‡', header=None)
  #tf=pandas.read_csv(StringIO(data), sep='\Ç', header=None)
  print(tf)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The data came out like below from the file </p>
  
  <pre><code>1Ã‡71Ã‡23929Ã‡44Ã‡5685Ã‡0Ã‡0Ã‡1Ã‡aaÃ‡012Ã‡FillerÃ‡
  1Ã‡72Ã‡23953Ã‡40Ã‡3319Ã‡0Ã‡0Ã‡1Ã‡bbÃ‡011Ã‡FillerÃ‡
  1Ã‡73Ã‡23957Ã‡43Ã‡7323Ã‡0Ã‡0Ã‡1Ã‡ccÃ‡011Ã‡FillerÃ‡
  1Ã‡74Ã‡24006Ã‡41Ã‡6938Ã‡0Ã‡0Ã‡1Ã‡bbÃ‡014Ã‡FillerÃ‡
  1Ã‡75Ã‡24140Ã‡45Ã‡0518Ã‡0Ã‡0Ã‡1Ã‡ddÃ‡011Ã‡FillerÃ‡
  
  Output
  
      0    1      2   3     4   5   6   7   8   9      10  11
  0    1  71  23929  44  5685   0   0   1  aa  12  Filler NaN
  1    1  72  23953  40  3319   0   0   1  bb  11  Filler NaN
  2    1  73  23957  43  7323   0   0   1  cc  11  Filler NaN
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>So using the sep='Ã‡' instead of sep='\Ç' worked. Not sure why it appears this way when i run the script, coz to the naked eye (when i open the sample.dat file) it appears delimited with cedilla symbol.</p>
  
  <p>is there a way to pass the textfile without reading externally onto the pandas.read_csv (StringIO) command? 
  I ask this because i wanted to limit the number of rows i read and put in the Dataframe. Say if i want to have only the first few rows i added a Totrows and to have last few i used skiprows. That way to process the huge file with millions of rows it would take minimal time. If this is not possible i ll use a for loop ofcourse. Just wanted to check if there was a way to do without for loop. </p>
  
  <p>Thanks, VB</p>