CSV (.csv)
CSV is a table of coordinates as plain text — one row per point, one column per field. It is the format to use when the destination is a spreadsheet, a database or a script rather than a GPS device.
At a glance
| Extension | .csv |
| Encoding | csv |
| Media type | text/csv |
| Invented | 1972 |
| By | No single inventor; standardised retrospectively by the IETF |
| Current version | RFC 4180, published October 2005 |
History
CSV predates the personal computer. IBM's Fortran compiler under OS/360 supported comma-separated list-directed input and output in 1972, and the term "comma-separated value" was in print by 1983. For decades it was a convention rather than a standard; the IETF published RFC 4180 in October 2005, which finally defined the quoting rules and registered the text/csv media type.
Where it is used
Every spreadsheet program opens CSV — Excel, LibreOffice Calc, Numbers, Google Sheets — as do relational databases, GIS tools and any scripting language worth the name. Over 200 government and institutional open-data portals publish in it. For GPS work it is the export of choice when the data is going to be analysed rather than navigated.
Structure
A CSV file is lines of fields separated by a delimiter, with the first line usually naming the columns. RFC 4180 uses a comma, terminates lines with CR/LF, and requires a field containing a comma, a double quote or a line break to be wrapped in double quotes, with an embedded quote doubled. The semicolon variant exists because German and other European locales use the comma as the decimal separator, which would otherwise collide with the field delimiter in every coordinate — RouteConverter supports both, which is why there are two formats and not one.
How widespread
Universal, and universally under-specified. RFC 4180 describes the common case, but real files vary in delimiter, quoting, line endings, encoding and column order, so the columns in a GPS CSV are whatever the exporting program chose to write.
RouteConverter support
| Reads | CSV Comma, CSV Semicolon |
| Writes | CSV Comma, CSV Semicolon |
This page covers the two generic CSV formats. RouteConverter also reads a number of logger-specific CSV layouts — Columbus, Haicom, i-Blue 747, Qstarz BT-Q1000, Route 66 and Flightradar 24 — which have their own fixed column sets and their own pages.