Formatting for CSV Output

The CSV format (comma separated values) is the most basic output format because there is no style formatting.

This type of output is designed to be outputted in a manner that can be read by other systems. The only known limitation of this format is that you cannot have joins in the query or IBM® Cognos® will produce an error. To avoid this problem, you can create a single CQS which you use for the CSV output.

When the report is generated, it will still appear in Excel format and the File Download dialog will open. This is similar to the Excel dialog with no indication it is for a CSV file.

When you open the file you will see the file is correctly formatted for CSV (Showing two columns, with the second column clipped due to its size). In CSV formatting you can't have word wrap.

To save this in its final format, click Save As and select a file name and the file type as CSV.

When you open the TXT file in Notepad, you will see the commas separating the two columns. When there is a comma itself in the data, you can also see the double quotation marks at the beginning of the second column for some records indicating that this problem is resolved.