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The problem with CSV isn't that it's text based, the problem is that "CSV" isn't a file format with an authoritative description.
by nightcracker 6y ago
The problem with CSV isn't that it's text based, the problem is that "CSV" isn't a file format with an authoritative description.
- jandrese 6y agoThere is a RFC (4180) for CSV, but the truth of the matter is that there are thousands of parsers written to whatever spec the author thought up. In the real world the entire spec is contained in its three word name. In the end I think the simplicity was also a weakness. Because the spec is so minimal a programmer goes "Oh, I'll just write my own, no problem", where a more complex protocol would have necessitated finding some exisiting library instead. Whatever the author of that library did would become the defacto standard and there would be less incompatibility between files.
- sgtnoodle 6y agoThat reminds me of the time I needed to parse some XML and ended up writing my own parser...