Proposed patch for customizable org-table-export

Proposed patch for customizable org-table-export

[Colin Williams]

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I've created the custom variable org-table-export-delimiter so that the user
may customize the string that delimits the columns exported.

I believe this is useful because in some areas (namely, my office) people
insist on the files being in csv (comma separated values).

I've also noticed (but haven't bothered fixing yet) that if a field contains
the delimiter string (be it a tab or a comma), then the resulting exported
file has misaligned columns.  In csv format, this is remedied by surround
the offending columns in double quotes.  I'm not sure, but I believe tab
separated format usually handles separator character disambiguation in a
similar way.

I've attached the patch for my change, but as this patch is the first thing
I've contributed to org-mode, I'm still waiting on the paperwork from the
gnu foundation.  Also, I've actually never contributed a patch to a free
project before, so I'm sorry if the patch file is incorrectly formatted.

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--- org.el~	2008-05-05 23:09:50.000000000 -0400
+++ org.el	2008-10-28 22:50:18.204880700 -0400
@@ -8510,6 +8510,11 @@ are found, lines will be split on whites
     (insert-file-contents file)
     (org-table-convert-region beg (+ (point) (- (point-max) pm)) arg)))
 
+(defcustom org-table-export-delimiter "\t"
+  "The default separator for exported tables."
+  :group 'org-table-settings
+   :type 'string)
+
 (defun org-table-export ()
   "Export table as a tab-separated file.
 Such a file can be imported into a spreadsheet program like Excel."
@@ -8542,7 +8547,7 @@ Such a file can be imported into a sprea
 	    (delete-char 1)))
       (goto-char (point-min))
       (while (re-search-forward "[ \t]*|[ \t]*" nil t)
-	(replace-match "\t" t t))
+	(replace-match org-table-export-delimiter t t))
       (save-buffer))
     (kill-buffer buf)))
 

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Re: Proposed patch for customizable org-table-export

[Bernt Hansen]

"Colin Williams" <lackita@gmail.com> writes:

> I've created the custom variable org-table-export-delimiter so that the user
> may customize the string that delimits the columns exported.
>
> I believe this is useful because in some areas (namely, my office) people
> insist on the files being in csv (comma separated values).
>
> I've also noticed (but haven't bothered fixing yet) that if a field contains
> the delimiter string (be it a tab or a comma), then the resulting exported
> file has misaligned columns.  In csv format, this is remedied by surround
> the offending columns in double quotes.  I'm not sure, but I believe tab
> separated format usually handles separator character disambiguation in a
> similar way.
>
> I've attached the patch for my change, but as this patch is the first thing
> I've contributed to org-mode, I'm still waiting on the paperwork from the
> gnu foundation.  Also, I've actually never contributed a patch to a free
> project before, so I'm sorry if the patch file is incorrectly formatted.

My version of org-mode already exports in CSV format just fine.

I create a test file

,----[ x.org ]
| | Z     | B     |     C |       D |
| |-------+-------+-------+---------|
| | 1     | 2     |     3 |       4 |
| | 7,234 | 7,222 | 154.0 |      11 |
| | abc   | def   |   ghi | jkl,lmn |
`----

M-x org-table-export

prompts for a filename (x.csv)

and a format orgtbl-to-csv

and I get this

,----[ x.csv ]
| Z,B,C,D
| 1,2,3,4
| "7,234","7,222",154.0,11
| abc,def,ghi,"jkl,lmn"
`----

I have the following settings in my .emacs since I export to CSV by
default

,----
| (setq org-table-export-default-format "orgtbl-to-csv")
`----

Org-mode version 6.10c (release_6.10c-20-g17c55f1 <- from git describe)
which is 20 commits after the release_6.10c tag on commit
17c55f1b10b2ad77b830bc057c722ffc99611337
^^^^^^^

This has been available for a long time I believe.

-Bernt