How to always write Windows style newlines to a file?

ruby-talk
1

I need to write a CSV file and I know that I always want Windows style
newlines on it (for import into Excel).

I want to make sure that every line is terminated with "\r\n" (CRLF)
regardless of platform. How do I write the "\n" when the code executes
on Windows without ending up with \r\r\n at the end of every line?

I've tried using <<, write, and syswrite against my IO (file) object.
How do I just write the CR and LF characters to my file?

Thanks,
Wes

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2

I've done this in the past - is this the best way to do it?

#Add a \r character on non-Windows platforms
upload_file << "#{target.dump_output}"
upload_file << "\r" unless Config::CONFIG['target_os'] =~ /win/
upload_file << "\n"

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3

Wes Gamble wrote:

I need to write a CSV file and I know that I always want Windows style
newlines on it (for import into Excel).

The line endings shouldn't matter. I write csv files on Linux systems
all the time, and open them with Excel without issue.

I want to make sure that every line is terminated with "\r\n" (CRLF)
regardless of platform. How do I write the "\n" when the code executes
on Windows without ending up with \r\r\n at the end of every line?

If you still really want to do this, you can set $/ (record separator)
to "\r\n".

Regards,

Dan

4

You sure this works?

$ ruby -e '$/="\r\n"; puts "foo", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \n b a r \n
0000010

Output record separator doesn't seem to help either:

$ ruby -e '$\="\r\n"; puts "foo", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \n b a r \n
0000010

Explicit works:

$ ruby -e 'print "foo\r\n", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \r \n b a r
0000010

$ ruby -v
ruby 1.8.5 (2006-08-25) [i386-cygwin]

Hm... Is this a bug in Ruby 1.8.5 or am I missing something?

  robert

···

On 13.12.2006 19:04, Daniel Berger wrote:

Wes Gamble wrote:

I need to write a CSV file and I know that I always want Windows style
newlines on it (for import into Excel).

The line endings shouldn't matter. I write csv files on Linux systems
all the time, and open them with Excel without issue.

I want to make sure that every line is terminated with "\r\n" (CRLF)
regardless of platform. How do I write the "\n" when the code executes
on Windows without ending up with \r\r\n at the end of every line?

If you still really want to do this, you can set $/ (record separator)
to "\r\n".

5

If you still really want to do this, you can set $/ (record separator)

That would be $\, the _output_ record separator.

to "\r\n".

But that's a valid solution only if you set binmode on the filehandle, otherwise you'll get a double \r on Windows.

-- fxn

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On Dec 13, 2006, at 7:10 PM, Daniel Berger wrote:

6

Yeah. You're using the disaster known as cygwin.

-austin

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On 12/13/06, Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> wrote:

$ ruby -e 'print "foo\r\n", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \r \n b a r
0000010

$ ruby -v
ruby 1.8.5 (2006-08-25) [i386-cygwin]

Hm... Is this a bug in Ruby 1.8.5 or am I missing something?

--
Austin Ziegler * halostatue@gmail.com * http://www.halostatue.ca/
               * austin@halostatue.ca * You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike. // halo • statue
               * austin@zieglers.ca

7

So if I open the file using "b" I can write the bytes as I intend using
<<, is that correct?

That's simple and makes sense - how novel ;).

Thanks,
Wes

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8

So far it has served me very well. The fact that cygwin not generally prevents the output of "\r\n" makes me believe there has to be something in the implementation of Ruby. Maybe you can elaborate further in what disastrous ways cygwin interferes here (other than running on a Windows box). I also noticed this - on a Linux box:

PDBRK_MYSQL:~# ruby -e '$\="\r\n"; puts "foo", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \n b a r \n
0000010
PDBRK_MYSQL:~# uname -a
Linux PDBRK_MYSQL 2.6.8-2-386 #1 Tue Aug 16 12:46:35 UTC 2005 i686 GNU/Linux
PDBRK_MYSQL:~# ruby -v
ruby 1.8.2 (2005-04-11) [i386-linux]

Now, is Debian Linux disastrous, too? :slight_smile:

Kind regards

  robert

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On 13.12.2006 23:14, Austin Ziegler wrote:

On 12/13/06, Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> wrote:

$ ruby -e 'print "foo\r\n", "bar"' | od -c
0000000 f o o \r \n b a r
0000010

$ ruby -v
ruby 1.8.5 (2006-08-25) [i386-cygwin]

Hm... Is this a bug in Ruby 1.8.5 or am I missing something?

Yeah. You're using the disaster known as cygwin.