Supported Delimitation Types

The Mixed Quote and Comma delimitation method is the default setting for BarTender because it works with comma delimited, as well as quote and comma delimited files. In a standard delimited dBASE text file, numeric fields are normally delimited by commas, while character string fields are delimited by double quotation marks and commas. Assuming that the first field of each line is a numeric field in your dBASE program, the data saved to the file would look like this:

Since there are four lines in the file, four different items with three different types of data would be printed.

In a quote and comma delimited text file, the individual fields are separated by both quotes and commas. An example of a quote and comma delimited file would look like this:

Since there are four lines in the file, four different items will be printed. Note that each line of the file contains three fields of data for each record. Each field has quotes around it and is separated from the others by a comma. For example, the first record contains an identification number of 0543166. This number would most likely be printed as a barcode. The text fields "Oranges" and "Perishable" may also appear on the same printed item. Almost all database, spreadsheet, and word processing software can create data files in this format.

In a comma delimited text file, the individual fields are separated by commas. An example of a comma delimited file would look like this:

Since there are four lines in the file, four different items with three different types of data would be printed.

There is a space in the second field of the second line between the word "Flower" and the word "Pots". Comma delimitation recognizes spaces as long as they are embedded in between the data characters in a field. However, when the data for an individual field includes "leading" or "trailing" spaces that you wish to print, you must use quote and comma delimitation. Comma delimitation will automatically strip all leading and trailing spaces.

Tab delimitation uses a tab character to separate between fields. An example of a tab delimited file would look like this:

Since there are four lines in the file, four different items with three different types of data would be printed.

It is possible to use any single character delimiter to separate information on a single line. The following example demonstrates a user defined delimiter file that uses a colon for the field delimiter:

Since there are four lines in the file, four different items with three different types of data would be printed.

A text file with fixed-width fields is one in which each field in a record begins at a fixed number of character positions from the beginning of the record. Because of this, there is no need to separate fields from each other with any delimiting characters.

The following is an example of records with fixed-width fields. The first field in each record has eight character positions, the second has ten, and the third has ten. Notice that in the second record, no delimiting character separates "Cantaloupe" from "Perishable". None is needed, because your document can be set up to always treat the 19th character as the beginning of the third field.