Media Type "text/csv": new draft (-02) and Last Call
Yakov Shafranovich
YakovS at solidmatrix.com
Sun Apr 3 08:18:30 CEST 2005
I added this language to the -04 draft. Regarding the issue of the
header, I added an optional "header" parameter to the MIME type that can
be used to indicate the presence or absence of the header line.
Yakov
clyde.ingram at edl.uk.eds.com wrote:
> Yakov,
>
> That draft wording sounds excellent.
>
> Now, if you were to ALSO mandate the presence of the header record, that
> would mitigate my concern that computer applications should be able to
> exchange CSV files without worrying about same field order (simply
> because the header conveys the field names, rather than needing an
> out-of-band, bilateral agreement). And, of course, presence of a header
> record lets a computer application determine immediately whether the
> supplied fields are likely to be what it expects. All good aids for
> careful validation.
>
> Thank-you,
> Clyde
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Yakov Shafranovich [mailto:research at solidmatrix.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, March 30, 2005 8:08 PM
> To: clyde.ingram at edl.uk.eds.com
> Cc: GK-lists at ninebynine.org; ietf-types at alvestrand.no
> Subject: Re: Media Type "text/csv": new draft (-02) and Last Call
>
>
> clyde.ingram at edl.uk.eds.com wrote:
> >
> > But the same cannot be said of automated computer-based applications,
> > where maintaining a strict count of generated and expected
> > Comma-Separated-Values per record is not only easy, but also allows for
> > an extra level of data validation: namely that a received record is
> > corrupt if it has too few or too many fields. This is where
> > standardisation in the format of the CSV records becomes appropriate
> > material for an RFC.
> >
>
> The draft as it is written now (-03) does not mandate that the same
> number of fields need to appear on each line, mainly due to the fact
> that the draft is focusing on the MIME type registration. Would the
> following change to section 2, subsection 4 be sufficient to address
> your concerns:
>
> "Within the header and each record there may be one or more fields,
> separated by commas. Each line should contain the same number of fields
> throughout the file. The last field in the record may not be followed by
> a comma. For example:"
>
> Yakov
>
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