4 ms·

Good in-depth insights into each format. This complements nicely with a site I created called tech-diff (https://tech-diff.com/file/ https://tech-diff.com/file/

by pitah1 3y ago

Good in-depth insights into each format. This complements nicely with a site I created called tech-diff (https://tech-diff.com/file/ https://tech-diff.com/file/) where it provides a summary of the file formats.

hermitcrab 3y ago
"Comma-Separated Values (CSV) is a text file format that uses commas to separate values in plain text." Except when it uses semi-colons. Or pipes. Or something else.
- justsomehnguy 3y ago
  The most amusing thing is what there are symbols designated as separators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/C0_and_C1_control_codes#Field_separators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/C0_and_C1_control_codes#Fiel...
  - hermitcrab 3y ago
    Oh yes. I wrote about that here: https://successfulsoftware.net/2022/04/30/why-isnt-there-a-decent-file-format-for-tabular-data/ https://successfulsoftware.net/2022/04/30/why-isnt-there-a-d... And discussed at HN here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31220841 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31220841
    - justsomehnguy 3y ago
      Oh! Great article and, if the evil twist of fate would force me to write an export, I hope I would remember and use .usv But I can't agree on 'default tools' - anything bigger than 3 columns is PITA to look at and I just Ctrl+H to replace the commas with tabs or \r\n (or whatever), depending on the format. At some point 'standart tools' doesn't matter anymore, because it doesn't worth to even use them on such files; think of 'jq'.
      - hermitcrab 3y ago
        >I just Ctrl+H to replace the commas with tabs or \r\n (or whatever) That may not work if the CSV is escaped/quoted (e.g. because the data contains commas). Or you could use our Easy Data Transform software. It pretty much handles all that horrible CSV stuff for you. ;0)
        justsomehnguy 3y ago
        Of course, but most of the time I just need to have a quick glance at the data, or find a single value which I know where it should be. Slightly on-topic: I found what LibreOffice Calc has a decent input wizard which most of the time works and good enough.
- pitah1 3y ago
  I was using the following RFC for the formal definition of CSV https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4180.html https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4180.html. When the delimiter is different, you have a different file format. TSV (tab-separated values) is an example of this.

by pitah1 3y ago

hermitcrab 3y ago

"Comma-Separated Values (CSV) is a text file format that uses commas to separate values in plain text." Except when it uses semi-colons. Or pipes. Or something else.

justsomehnguy 3y ago
The most amusing thing is what there are symbols designated as separators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/C0_and_C1_control_codes#Field_separators https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/C0_and_C1_control_codes#Fiel...
- hermitcrab 3y ago
  Oh yes. I wrote about that here: https://successfulsoftware.net/2022/04/30/why-isnt-there-a-decent-file-format-for-tabular-data/ https://successfulsoftware.net/2022/04/30/why-isnt-there-a-d... And discussed at HN here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31220841 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31220841
  - justsomehnguy 3y ago
    Oh! Great article and, if the evil twist of fate would force me to write an export, I hope I would remember and use .usv But I can't agree on 'default tools' - anything bigger than 3 columns is PITA to look at and I just Ctrl+H to replace the commas with tabs or \r\n (or whatever), depending on the format. At some point 'standart tools' doesn't matter anymore, because it doesn't worth to even use them on such files; think of 'jq'.
    - hermitcrab 3y ago
      >I just Ctrl+H to replace the commas with tabs or \r\n (or whatever) That may not work if the CSV is escaped/quoted (e.g. because the data contains commas). Or you could use our Easy Data Transform software. It pretty much handles all that horrible CSV stuff for you. ;0)
      - justsomehnguy 3y ago
        Of course, but most of the time I just need to have a quick glance at the data, or find a single value which I know where it should be. Slightly on-topic: I found what LibreOffice Calc has a decent input wizard which most of the time works and good enough.
pitah1 3y ago
I was using the following RFC for the formal definition of CSV https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4180.html https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4180.html. When the delimiter is different, you have a different file format. TSV (tab-separated values) is an example of this.