dennis@oatmeal.nl
Member
My contractor uses excel 2003 and uses closed desktop computers so we can't install a different version.
i've created a form with a free text-field in it. Sometimes clients put a comma (or multiple) in this text field.
When importing the entries in excel, excel thinks those comma's are for field separation and thus it messes up my data. Is there a way to export using semicolon or other format.
Can you send us an example of one of your csv files having this issue to carl@rocketgenius.com?
The entry export escapes the field values by wrapping them in double quotes. Excel should see these double quotes and know the values in between them are the field values, including commas. It shouldn't be treating the commas as field separators if they appear within double quotes.
For example, our CSV generates data like this:
"Test","Test","test@test.com","This is a test, of commas in paragraph, fields."
Not like this:
Test,Test,test@test.com,This is a test, of commas in paragraph, fields.
So Excel should know anything within those double quotes (including commas) is the field value.
dennis@oatmeal.nl
Member
I figured out what the issue is but i don't have a solution yet.
The trouble is caused with users putting in a return in a textarea field.
Excel 2003, translates every return in a new column or row.
is there a way to prevent users putting a return in the textarea field, or to filter the return when exporting?
