Python bulk load is slower than expected

A user has reported that bulk loading data with the Python API is slower than expected. He said that neither the network nor the WriteEngine seem to be the bottleneck, so he suspects that performance can be improved.

One suggestion provided was to have some functions in the Python API where he could pass the data already formatted for the table, and then have all the setColumn calls and data casting performed in the underlying C API instead of Python. He suspects that this would probably help to speed up the load process.