pytecio

pytecio is a small reader for legacy Tecplot ASCII files.

The useful niche for this repo is narrow but still real: if you have old Tecplot .dat exports and no Tecplot license anymore, this gives you a lightweight way to pull the data into Python and move on.

Scope

pytecio is intentionally limited.

• Reads legacy Tecplot ASCII data.
• Returns numeric pandas.DataFrame objects for zone data.
• Returns numeric connectivity tables for simple unstructured zones.
• Works without Tecplot or a Tecplot license.

It is not intended to be a full Tecplot API replacement.

What Is Supported

The current test suite covers:

• Structured ASCII zones.
• Simple unstructured ASCII zones with Nodes= and Elements=.
• Variable definitions on one line or split across multiple lines.
• Lowercase or uppercase Tecplot keywords.
• Multi-zone files.
• 1D/list-style Tecplot monitor files via read1D().

What Is Not Supported

• Binary Tecplot files such as .plt or .szplt.
• Full Tecplot feature coverage.
• Preserving AUXDATA metadata.
• Rich mesh semantics beyond the raw connectivity table.

Quoted variable names are the tested path.

Installation

Install from a clone:

pip install .

Dependencies:

• numpy
• pandas

Usage

Read a Tecplot ASCII file:

from pytecio import read_ascii

zones, zone_data, connectivity = read_ascii("solution.dat")

Returned values:

• zones: list of zone names as plain strings.
• zone_data: list of numeric pandas.DataFrame objects, one per zone.
• connectivity: list of numeric pandas.DataFrame objects for unstructured connectivity.

Read a Tecplot-style 1D monitor file:

from pytecio import read1D

monitor = read1D("monitor.dat", to_pandas=True)

read1D(..., to_pandas=True) returns a numeric pandas.DataFrame. Without to_pandas=True, it returns (variables, data) where data is a NumPy array.

Development

Run the tests with:

pytest -q

The repository includes small Tecplot ASCII fixtures for structured, unstructured, and multi-zone cases under tests/testdata/.