# Parsing GTF and FASTA files using the eccLib Library

## TL;DR

eccLib is a fast Python-based library for parsing genomic files like GTF and FASTA, offering high-performance genomic context analysis.

## Contribution

The novel contribution is the development of eccLib, a high-performance C-based library for genomic file parsing in Python.

## Key findings

- eccLib is the fastest Python-based solution for parsing genomic files.
- The library is implemented in C, enabling optimizations not possible in Python.
- It supports parsing GTF/GFFv3 and FASTA files with additional analysis methods.

## Abstract

Leveraging the Python/C API, eccLib was developed as a high-performance library designed for parsing genomic files and analysing genomic contexts. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the fastest Python-based solution available. With eccLib, users can efficiently parse GTF/GFFv3 and FASTA files and utilize the provided methods for additional analysis.

This library is implemented in C and distributed under the GPL-3.0 licence. It is compatible with any system that has the Python interpreter (CPython) installed. The use of C enables numerous optimizations at both the implementation and algorithmic levels, which are either unachievable or impractical in Python.