Import csv file: How can I merge information from different lines?

Question

I am trying to compile a bilingual dictionary from a spreadsheet file that was exported as csv. The file contains columns with the kinds of information that one would expect from a dictionary: lexeme, part of speech, gender, sense, example sentence, example translation. I am simplifying things here for a better explanation.

lexeme,partofspeech,gender,sense,example,extranslation

For my tex-file I used \newcommand to create an \entry command with six arguments. In this way, I can define the formatting (parentheses, italics, headers, etc.)

\newcommand{\entry}[6]{\markboth{#1}{#1}{\textbf{#1}}\ {\textcolor{blue}{(#2)}}\ {#3}\ $\bullet$\ {#4} \ {\textit{#5}} {#6}\vspace{0.2cm}\par}

In the document, I call \entry when importing the csv-file. I used the csvsimple package to import my csv-file. Following \csvreader: the {first argument} identifies the csv-file, the {second argument} defines my table headings, the {third argument} contains the \entry command that is applied to each line in the csv.

\csvreader{dictionary.csv}{lexeme=\lexeme,partofspeech=\partofspeech,gender=\gender,sense=\sense,example=\example,extranslation=\extranslation}{\entry{\lexeme}{\partofspeech}{\gender}{\sense}{\example}{\extranslation}}

All this works fine for a csv-file that looks like this:

lexeme,partofspeech,gender,sense,example,extranslation
lexeme-1,noun,feminine,translation-1,example-1,extranslation-1
lexeme-2,noun,masculine,translation-2,example-2,extranslation-2

However, there are lexemes/entries that contain more than one example sentence. And they looks like this:

lexeme,partofspeech,gender,sense,example,extranslation
lexeme-1,noun,feminine,translation-1,example-1a,extranslation-1a
,,,,example-1b,extranslation-1b

Moreover, there are lexemes/entries that have more than one sense. and they would look like this:

lexeme,partofspeech,gender,sense,example,extranslation
lexeme-1,noun,feminine,translation-1a,example-1a,extranslation-1a
,verb,,translation-1b,example-1b,translation-1b,

With the \csvreader settings (above), I get problems. As one would expect, I get a new entry for each new line, when I really to add just an example/translation that belongs to the lexemes/entry in previous line. This would be relevant for all lines in which the first value is empty (i.e. that to not have a lexeme). How can I do this?

EDIT: I was asked to provide a MWE

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside]{article}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{csvsimple}
\usepackage{color}
\newcommand{\entry}[6]{\markboth{#1}{#1}{\textbf{#1}}\ {\textcolor{blue}{(#2)}}\ {#3}\ $\bullet$\ {#4} \ {\textit{#5}} {#6}\vspace{0.2cm}\par}
\begin{document}
    \csvreader{dictionary.csv}{lexeme=\lexeme,partofspeech=\partofspeech,gender=\gender,sense=\sense,example=\example,extranslation=\extranslation}{\entry{\lexeme}{\partofspeech}{\gender}{\sense}{\example}{\extranslation}}
\end{document}

The csv-file look like this:

lexeme,partofspeech,gender,sense,example,extranslation
lexeme-1,noun,feminine,translation-1a,example-1a,extranslation-1a
,verb,,translation-1b,example-1b,translation-1b
lexeme-2,noun,feminine,translation-2,example-2a,extranslation-2a
,,,,example-2b,extranslation-2b

The pdf-output of the MWE contains four dictionary entries. What I want to achieve is that lines two and four from the csv-file are appended to the respective cells (i.e. in the same column) of the preceding line.

Answer 1

You can test for the setting you need, and only start a new paragraph at the start of really new entries.

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside]{article}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{csvsimple}
\usepackage{color}
\newcommand{\entry}[6]{%
\if$#1$\else\markboth{#1}{#1}\par\textbf{#1}\ {\textcolor{blue}{(#2)}}\ {#3}\ $\bullet$\ {#4} \fi
\ \textit{#5} {#6}%
}
\begin{document}
\setlength\parskip{.5ex}
    \csvreader{dictionary.csv}{
lexeme=\lexeme,
partofspeech=\partofspeech,
gender=\gender,sense=\sense,
example=\example,
extranslation=\extranslation}{%
\entry{\lexeme}{\partofspeech}{\gender}{\sense}{\example}{\extranslation}}
\end{document}