Convert Fixed-Width to CSV | Dataford Interview Questions

Write a fixed-length to comma-separated text parser.

Implement parse_fixed_width(text, field_lengths). The input contains newline-separated fixed-width records, and field_lengths gives each field width in order. Return one comma-separated record per input line, trimming surrounding spaces from fields and escaping fields that contain commas or double quotes using standard CSV rules. Records are valid and each line has a length equal to the sum of the field widths. Return an empty string when text is empty.

Input: text is a string and field_lengths is a non-empty list of positive integers.

Output: A CSV-formatted string without a trailing newline.

Constraints

0 <= len(text) <= 10^5
1 <= len(field_lengths) <= 100
1 <= field_lengths[i] <= 10^4
Each non-empty input line has length equal to sum(field_lengths)
Input records do not contain embedded newline characters inside a field
Fields may contain commas or double quotes

Function Signature

def parse_fixed_width(text, field_lengths):

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