Parsing a file with ".data" extension in Python?

Question

I'm using idle in OS X, and I'm trying to parse a file with .data extension:

FP = open('<filename>.data','r')
lines=FP.readlines()
print lines

but this prints an empty array: []

I also tried Sublime but also doesn't work. What is another method to use in Python to read this?

Answer 1

open it in binary mode and print the repr of its contents instead

print os.stat("filename.data") #ensure that st_size > 0

with open("filename.data","rb") as f:
    print repr(f.read())

if this gives an empty string than you indeed have an empty file ...

im guessing ls -l tells you that the file is 0 bytes big?