[Resolved] Member import delimiter problem

[permaculturegeek]

I am trying to import a csv file of individual member data to our test installation of civiCRM (4.4.2).
However, whenever I proceed to the mapping stage, the importer is seeing an entire row as a single field.
I have tried changing delimiter (; to ,) and have tried quoting all strings - nothing seems to make a difference. The contacts import didn't have this problem, and I recall there being fields where you could define delimiters on the first screen of that process.

Any ideas?

Richard

[CiviTeacher.com]

Try making sure the CSV is encoded as UTF8

[Shai]

Hi Permaculture Geek,

I had the problem you had. For me the problem was MS Excel 2008 on a Mac. It simply wouldn't create a csv in the way that CiviCRM wanted.

I switched to using LibreOffice and the problem was solved.

I prefer Excel to LibreOffice, so I manipulate all data using Excel, save the file in .xlsx format (I dont' want to have multipel csv's that I get confused. Then I open LibreOffice and open the .xlsx file and than save as a .csv. And then no problem with CiviCRM.

Even if your situation is slightly different than mine, I still would give a shot at using a different program to create your csv file.

And as CiviTeacher.com wrote, do make sure the encoding is UTF8.

Shai

[permaculturegeek]

First, yes, I always use UTF8, and I was using Apache Openoffice, although the file would have been last saved by Editplus.

I got it to work by changing the delimiter to pipe, as I recalled that was what civi was using in exports. Taking another look at contacts import, I see the delimiter field is an override for the defaults. However, having been right through Admin->System Settings I can't find anywhere that I might view or edit the defaults.

[JonGold]

The delimiter is set in Administer -> Localization -> Languages, Currency, Locations.  It's counterintuitive, though it helps if you know that the preferred delimiter tends to be a matter of national preference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma-separated_values#Example

[permaculturegeek]

Thanks Jon. Adding to our private documentation.