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What is CSV? A Practical Definition

2026-07-283 min read

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What is CSV?

CSV (Comma-Separated Values) is a plain-text format for tabular data, where each line is a row and commas separate columns. It has no official type system — every value is a string until the consumer parses it — so quoting rules (RFC 4180) around commas, quotes, and newlines inside fields are the most common source of parsing bugs.

Example

name,role
Ada,Engineer
"Grace, Rear Admiral",Engineer

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