quirks with csv files

[The alMIGHTY N]

Hi all,

I have an application that spits out a comma-delimited csv file. The
file is plain text without any strange characters that can't be read by
say Notepad.

When I open this file in Excel, it converts to a spreadsheet format
with each field in its own cell, just as I imagine it should.

When our client opens this file in Excel, there is only one column of
cells, each of which contains the entire row's worth of data with the
comments mixed in... it basically includes the commas as content for
the cell.

Is this just a matter of some option being different in the two Excel
installations? Is there any other reason, aside from different versions
or different configurations of the application, why the file would open
differently?

Thanks,

N

 

[David McRitchie]

Is your client in the same country, more to the point is their
delimiter set up the same as your in your "Windows" Control Panel.

If the extension is ".CSV" then Excel kind of remembers what
was done before with a .CSV file. It would be better to use
".txt" as the extension then open the file and choose delimited
then choose comma on the next panel.

Since the client has the data all in one column they can do the
same as the above by selecting Column A, then Data, Text to Columns.