How does this tool handle files with mixed delimiters?

It detects alternative delimiters like tabs or semicolons within the same file and rewrites them to match your target delimiter.

What is the difference between this tool and a standard CSV validator?

A validator only reports formatting errors, whereas this surgeon actively repairs the malformed rows and outputs a clean file.

How does the optional AI repair feature work?

It reviews rows flagged as suspicious after the deterministic pass and attempts to rewrite them, falling back to the rule-based result if the structure is unsafe.

Can I convert a tab-separated file to a comma-separated file?

Yes, by setting the input delimiter to Tab and the target delimiter to Comma, the tool will normalize the delimiters during the repair process.

Is my data sent to a server during the deterministic repair?

No, the deterministic repair rules run entirely offline in your browser using pure string processing.

CSV Malformed Row Surgeon | Online Free Tool

Examples

1. Resolving Stray Quotes and Mixed Delimiters in CRM Exports

Data Engineer

Background

A CRM export contains a mix of comma-separated and tab-separated rows, along with unescaped quotes in the notes field, causing the database import script to crash.

Problem

The import script expects a strict comma-separated format and fails on row 2 due to an unescaped quote, and row 3 due to tab delimiters.

How to use

Paste the CRM export into the CSV data field, set the input delimiter to Comma, set the target delimiter to Comma, and check 'Unescape stray quotes' and 'Detect and rewrite mixed delimiters'.

{
  "delimiter": ",",
  "targetDelimiter": ",",
  "unescapeStrayQuotes": true,
  "detectMixedDelimiters": true
}

Outcome

The tool escapes the stray quotes, converts the tab delimiters to commas, and outputs a clean CSV with a row-level diff showing the exact changes.

2. Cleaning Windows BOM and CRLF for Linux ETL Pipelines

ETL Developer

Background

A CSV file generated on Windows contains a UTF-8 BOM header and CRLF line endings, which causes parsing errors in a strict Linux ETL pipeline.

Problem

The pipeline fails to read the first column header due to the hidden BOM character and rejects the file due to carriage return characters.

{
  "stripBom": true,
  "normalizeLineEndings": true
}

CSV Malformed Row Surgeon | Online Free Tool | Elysia Tools

CSV Malformed Row Surgeon

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Examples

1. Resolving Stray Quotes and Mixed Delimiters in CRM Exports

2. Cleaning Windows BOM and CRLF for Linux ETL Pipelines

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