PHP to CSV line break issue

Question

I use the following code to get data from a form and save it as csv.

$cvsData = $name . "," . $address . "\n";

$fp = fopen("file.csv", "a");

if ($fp) {
    fwrite($fp, $cvsData); // Write information to the file
    fclose($fp); // Close the file
}

When someone enters a comma or line break in address field it breaks the formatting. So how can i escape it so that the whole address stays in the same field ?

Solution

Put each data item inside quotation marks. A pair of quotation marks inside a quoted value signifies a single quotation mark. e.g.

"Daniel Norton","Congress Ave.
Austin (""Keeping it weird""), TX"

Referring to your example:

$data = str_replace('"','""',$data);
$address = str_replace('"','""',$address);
$cvsData = "\"$data\",\"$address\"\n";

Better still, just use the PHP function fputcsv.

fputcsv($fp,array($data,$address));

Comments

[Mark Baker]

start using PHP's built-in fputcsv() functions for writing csv files rather than building your own $cvsData line... then, at least, you don't need to worry about commas in your data

[danorton]

I have added more detail, using your example.