4 ms·
I agree with the JSON suggestion, but what advantage is there to TSV versus CSV? I have experienced pain with both characters (tab and comma), particularly wh
by daniellarusso 6y ago
I agree with the JSON suggestion, but what advantage is there to TSV versus CSV?
I have experienced pain with both characters (tab and comma), particularly when I am not the one creating the output file.
- junon 6y agoTabs do not appear in common literature. They're easier to justify inputs not have them in order to avoid having a quotation or escaping mess. Commas are _way_ too common. CSV is an awful format anyway.
- theamk 6y agoIf you can make sure the data has no newlines or tabs, the TSV needs no quoting. It is just "split" function, which is present in every language and very easy to use. When I use it, I usually add a check to writer that there is no newlines or tabs in data, and assert if this is not the case. You use this tsv with Unix tools like "cut", "paste", and ad-hoc scripts. There is also "tsv" as defined by excel, which has quoting and stuff. It is basically a dialect of CSV (Python even uses the same module to read it), and has all the disadvantages of CSV. Avoid it.