Script to min-max normalize a dataset in Python

normalize.py

import sys 

def read_file(file_path):
    dataset = []
    with open(file_path, "r") as file:
        for line in file:
            str_values = line.split()
            row = [ float(value) for value in str_values if value not in [" ", "\n"] ]
            dataset.append(row)

    return dataset 

def treat_negative_entries(dataset):
    number_of_rows = len(dataset)
    number_of_columns = len(dataset[0])

    for j in range(number_of_columns):
        smallest_entry = dataset[0][j]

        for i in range(1, number_of_rows):
            smallest_entry = min(smallest_entry, dataset[i][j])
        
        if smallest_entry < 0:
            for i in range(number_of_rows):
                dataset[i][j] += (-smallest_entry)
    
    return dataset 

def normalize_value(value, smallest_value, delta):
    return ( value - smallest_value ) / delta 
 
def normalize_dataset(dataset):
    number_of_rows = len(dataset)
    number_of_columns = len(dataset[0])

    for j in range(number_of_columns):
        smallest_entry = dataset[0][j]
        biggest_entry = dataset[0][j]

        for i in range(1, number_of_rows):
            smallest_entry = min(smallest_entry, dataset[i][j])
            biggest_entry = max(biggest_entry, dataset[i][j])

        delta = biggest_entry - smallest_entry

        for i in range(number_of_rows):
            dataset[i][j] = normalize_value(dataset[i][j], smallest_entry, delta)
        
    return dataset

def to_string(dataset):
    for i, row in enumerate(dataset):
        for j, value in enumerate(row):
            dataset[i][j] = str("%.4f" % value)
    
    lines = [ " ".join(row) for row in dataset ]
    single_string = "\n".join(lines)

    return single_string 

def write_output(dataset_string, file_path):
    with open(file_path, "w") as file:
        file.write(dataset_string)

input_file_path = sys.argv[1]
output_file_path = sys.argv[2]

dataset = read_file(input_file_path)
non_negative = treat_negative_entries(dataset)
normalized = normalize_dataset(non_negative)
dataset_string = to_string(normalized)

write_output(dataset_string, output_file_path)