How to HTML encode a csv export

Question

I get

 QuattrodeÂ®

From a string that is HTML encoded as

Quattrode®

when viewing inside Excel 2007.

Routine

        Response.Clear();
        Response.Buffer = true;

        Response.ContentType = "text/comma-separated-values";
        Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment;filename=\"Expired.csv\"");

        Response.RedirectLocation = "export.csv";

        Response.Charset = "";
        //Response.Charset = "UTF-8";//this does not work either.
        EnableViewState = false;

        ExportUtility util = new ExportUtility();

        Response.Write(util.DataGridToCSV(gridViewExport, ","));

Basically DataGridToCSV() uses HttpUtility.HtmlDecode(stringBuilder.ToString()); and I can use visual studio's text visualizer and see the string looks correct (Quattrode®).

So something in the Response procedure or in Excel's interpretation of the file is not correct. Any idea how to fix?

UPDATE
Turns out that this is not interpreted properly in Excel or WordPad. I open it up in Notepad and the symbol shows up properly.

I'm pretty sure you have to select the proper text encoding to use when importing CSV's into Excel, don't you? Make sure you're hitting the UTF-8 charset. — lsuarez, Jun 22 '11 at 18:50

score 8 · Answer 1 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:14

I found the answer here https://stackoverflow.com/a/3300854/150342 and here https://stackoverflow.com/a/6460488/150342 Then put together this code:

    public static void WriteCSVToResponse(string csv, string filename)
    {
        HttpResponse response = HttpContext.Current.Response;
        response.Clear();
        response.ClearHeaders();
        response.ClearContent();
        response.ContentType = "text/csv";
        response.AddHeader("content-disposition", "attachment; filename=" + filename);
        response.ContentEncoding = Encoding.UTF8;

        byte[] BOM = new byte[] { 0xef, 0xbb, 0xbf };
        response.BinaryWrite(BOM);//write the BOM first
        response.BinaryWrite(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(csv));
        response.Flush();
        response.End();
    }

score 5 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 23 '11 at 15:34

5

Also try this

Response.ContentEncoding = Encoding.UTF32;

edited Jun 23 '11 at 15:34

P.Brian.Mackey

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answered Jun 22 '11 at 19:58

Aristos

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+1 Management just had a change of direction. I'll have to try these later as I've backed out to an older version of the program. – P.Brian.Mackey Jun 22 '11 at 20:35
Edited answer to use Encoding.UTF32 rather than UTF8. This did fix the issue. – P.Brian.Mackey Jun 23 '11 at 15:38

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Jun 22 '11 at 18:48

1

Response.Charset = "";

Try using something like UTF-8

answered Jun 22 '11 at 18:48

BRampersad

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Good suggestion, but it didnt work. I put `Response.Charset = "UTF-8";` and the issue is the same. – P.Brian.Mackey Jun 22 '11 at 18:50
Try ISO-8859-13 as suggested by http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms525304(v=vs.90).aspx – BRampersad Jun 22 '11 at 18:54
adding `Response.Charset = "ISO-8859-13";` produces the same result. – P.Brian.Mackey Jun 22 '11 at 18:57
Try ´Response.ContentEncoding = Encoding.Default;´ – janhartmann Jun 22 '11 at 19:59

How to HTML encode a csv export

3 Answers3

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