On Thu, Apr 15, 2010 at 12:29 AM, Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
> Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> writes:
>> Merlin Moncure wrote:
>>> aside: anyone know if postgres properly handles csv according to rfc4180?
>
>> Wow, I had no idea there was an RFC for CSV.
>
> Me either. I'd bet the percentage of "CSV"-using programs that actually
> conform to the RFC is very small anyway; so while it might be smart to
> make sure that what we *emit* follows the RFC, it's probably useless as
> a guide to what we need to *accept*.
I took a quick look at the rfc. It's very short and appears to codify
common practices. We follow it for both input and output except:
*) trailing spaces are supposed to preserved. we follow sql rules on
trailing spaces which I think makes this point moot.
*) csv is supposed to be CRLF *always*. We do not do this. We do
however read different types of newlines. So we are a 4180 reader but
not an emitter. Not so sure if I think changing this is a good idea
though without exposing a knob.
merlin