Javascript CSV Strings

Parse and Stringify for CSV strings. It's like JSON object but for CSV. It can also work row by row. And, if can parse strings, it can be use to parse files or streams too.

Contributors

• Nicolas Thouvenin
• J. Baumbach
• Sam Hauglustaine
• Rick Huizinga

Installation

With npm do:

$ npm install csv-string

Tests

Use mocha to run the tests.

$ npm install mocha
$ mocha test

API Documentation

parse(input : String, [separtor : String]) : Object

Parse input to convert to an array.

    var CSV = require('csv-string'),
     arr = CSV.parse('a,b,c\na,b,c');

    console.log(arr);

Output:

[ [ 'a', 'b', 'c' ], [ 'a', 'b', 'c' ] ]

stringify(input : Object, [separtor : String]) : String

Converts input to a CSV string.

    var CSV = require('csv-string');
    
    console.log(CSV.stringify(['a', 'b', 'c']));
    console.log(CSV.stringify([['c', 'd', 'e'], ['c','d','e']]));
    console.log(CSV.stringify({a:'e', b:'f', c:'g'}));

Output:

a,b,c

c,d,e
c,d,e

e,f,g

detect(input : String) : String

Detects the best separator.

    var CSV = require('csv-string');
    
    console.log(CSV.detect('a,b,c'));
    console.log(CSV.detect('a;b;c'));
    console.log(CSV.detect('a|b|c'));
    console.log(CSV.detect('a\tb\tc'));

Output:

,
;
|
\t

forEach(input : String, sep : String, callback : Function)

forEach(input : String, callback : Function)

callback(row : Array, index : Number) : undefined

Calls callback for each CSV row/line. The Array passed to callback contains the fields of the current row.

    var CSV = require('csv-string');
    var data = 'a,b,c\nd,e,f';
    CSV.forEach(data, ',', function(row, index) {
        console.log('#' + index + ' : ', row);
    });

Output:

#0 :  [ 'a', 'b', 'c' ]
#1 :  [ 'd', 'e', 'f' ]

read(input : String, sep : String, callback : Function) : Number

read(input : String, callback : Function) : Number

callback(row : Array) : undefined

Calls callback when a CSV row is readed. The Array passed to callback contains the fields of the row.
Returns the first offset after the row.

    var CSV = require('csv-string');
    var data = 'a,b,c\nd,e,f';
    var index = CSV.read(data, ',', function(row) {
        console.log(row);
    });
    console.log(data.slice(index));

Output:

[ 'a', 'b', 'c' ]
d,e,f

readAll(input : String, sep : String, callback : Function) : Number

readAll(input : String, callback : Function) : Number

callback(rows : Array) : undefined

Calls callback when a all CSV rows is readed. The Array passed to callback contains the rows of the file.
Returns the first offset after the last row.

    var CSV = require('csv-string');
    var data = 'a,b,c\nd,e,f';
    index = CSV.readAll(data, function(row) {
        console.log(row);
    });
    console.log('-' + data.slice(index) + '-');

Output:

[ [ 'a', 'b', 'c' ], [ 'd', 'e', 'f' ] ]
--

createStream(options : Array) : WritableStream

createStream() : WritableStream

Create a writable stream for CSV chunk. Options are :

• separator : To indicate the CSV separator. By default is comma (',')

Example : Read CSV file from the standard input.

    var stream = CSV.createStream();
    
    stream.on('data', function (row) {
         console.log(row);
      }
    )
    
    process.stdin.resume();
    process.stdin.setEncoding('utf8');
    process.stdin.pipe(stream);

Also

• https://npmjs.org/browse/keyword/csv
• http://www.uselesscode.org/javascript/csv/
• https://github.com/archan937/csonv.js

Benchmark

A for file and stream, there are many others packages that already exists. To compare them, I made a very basic benchmark (see ./bench for source code)

the test

    time node ./SCRITPNAME.js >/dev/null

the result

License

MIT/X11