title: How to read a text file with mixed data_types automatically in Python?
body: <p>I have several text files of mixed data types in different columns, 
  I want to read them so that the program recognizes each column type <strong>automatically</strong> as I do not know which column contains which type.</p>
  
  <p>When I read only numeric data I used the following, but it fails for mixed datatypes.</p>
  
  <pre><code>Import numpy as np
  Import csv
  train = np.array(list(csv.reader(open(self.source_data_file, "rb"), delimiter=','))).astype('float')
  </code></pre>