#33179 [Bgs]: backslash is not an escape character in correct CSV

ID: 33179 User updated by: fsb at thefsb dot org Reported By: fsb at thefsb dot org Status: Bogus Bug Type: Filesystem function related Operating System: os x 10.3 and freebsd 5.3 PHP Version: 4.3.10 New Comment: if backslash were an escape character to PHP then it would not appear in the parsed values from the following csv file: abc,123,abc,123,abc,123 abc,\ 123,abc,123,abc,123 abc,123\ ,abc,123,abc,123 abc,123,abc\,123,abc,123 abc,123,\"abc",123,abc,123 abc,123,"a\""bc",123,abc,123 abc,123,"a"\"bc",123,abc,123 abc,123,"a""bc"\ ,123,abc,123 in every case above, the backslash preceeds a special caracter in the csv file format. if backshalsh were generally an escape character then in these positions it should be removed by the csv parser leaving the following character as literal. Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2005-05-31 01:18:39] iliaa@php.net Thank you for taking the time to write to us, but this is not a bug. Please double-check the documentation available at http://www.php.net/manual/ and the instructions on how to report a bug at http://bugs.php.net/how-to-report.php As far as PHP is concerned backslash is an escape characte, which makes the demonstrated behaviour expected. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2005-05-30 02:22:52] fsb at thefsb dot org Description: ------------ why can i have a \ at the end of a field but not if i wrap it in " field delimiters? e.g. abc,123\,abc works fine but "abc","123\",abc produces only two columns this question has been asked before (#29278, #30476, etc.) and iliaa@php.net rejects the bug as bogus. i don't agree. if this is not a bug then this unusual use of \ to escape only closing field delimiting double quotes but not escape any other instances of double qotes or (it would appear) any other character SHOULD be documented. it is not. moreover this undocumented feature is not consistent with the specification of the CSV file format found here: http://www.creativyst.com/Doc/Articles/CSV/ CSV01.htm this csv spec suggests that backslash has no special meaning in the CSV format at all. indeed, in all my tests, fgetcsv appears to accord it no special meaning _except_ in this one particular case. such a surprising behaviour that deviates from common CSV file format conventions SHOULD be documented (or corrected). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Edit this bug report at http://bugs.php.net/?id=33179&edit=1