PARSE_CSV

This activity can parse a string of comma-separated values and extract and return the individual "column" values contained in it.

(This activity parses a single "instance" or "row" of a string of CSV values specified by the CSVSTRING input parameter.  If you wish to read and parse the content of multiple rows of a CSV file, refer to the FOR_EACH_CSVROW activity instead.)

The activity returns the extracted "column" values in two forms:

• As a variable list specified by the VALUESLIST output parameter.  The list will contain an entry for each column value found.  This output form has no inherent limit on the number of columns.  You can process the variable list in your Processing Sequence using a LOOP processing sequence directive.
• As discrete "column" values specified by the CSVCOLUMN1…10 output parameters.  The value of each "column" value (up to a maximum of ten values) will be placed in the corresponding output parameter.

You can choose which is the most convenient and appropriate form of the output to use according to the needs of your solution.

Activities that populate list variables are often followed by a LOOP processing sequence directive or other constructs to process the contents of the list.  Refer to Variables and Lists for more information about the use of list variables.

You can refer to the EXAMPLE_CSV02 Processing Sequence for an example of using the PARSE_CSV activity.

INPUT Parameters:

CSVSTRING: Required

This parameter must contain the string of CSV values to be parsed.

Eg: "value1,value2,value3"

SEPARATOR: Optional

If a non-comma separator is used, this value should contain the separator character. The separator should be 1 character in length and can consist of any character.

OUTPUT Parameters:

VALUESLIST

This output list will contain an entry for each column value found in the specified CSVSTRING value.

CSVCOLUMN1
CSVCOLUMN2
…
CSVCOLUMN10

These output parameters will contain the value for the corresponding column number, up to a maximum of ten column values.