Comma Separated files would likely exist because they're human readable, whereas FS/GS/RS/CR/LF are not visible.
There is "pipe delimited" which used "|" (ASCII 124 decimal) to separate fields, which actually makes way more sense, because that character is rarely used in normal text.
It's also a good separator when a human is reading the file.
They could be made visible. On MSDOS it was common to have editors show an arrow as ESC or EOF, respectively pointing left or right. A lone CR was a musical note.
I am not sure whether RS could have replaced LF or CR+LF in this kind of free-format database; overloading record and line separators makes sense. But if FS-separated fields were a thing, people on MSDOS would have been used to seeing ⌙ as a field separator and likewise for other OSes.
rswail|6 months ago
There is "pipe delimited" which used "|" (ASCII 124 decimal) to separate fields, which actually makes way more sense, because that character is rarely used in normal text.
It's also a good separator when a human is reading the file.
bonzini|6 months ago
I am not sure whether RS could have replaced LF or CR+LF in this kind of free-format database; overloading record and line separators makes sense. But if FS-separated fields were a thing, people on MSDOS would have been used to seeing ⌙ as a field separator and likewise for other OSes.
UltraSane|6 months ago