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Comment by danielvaughn | Hacker News Reader

Just a few days ago I needed to edit a CSV file from a codebase I was working on. Opened it up in Numbers, changed a couple of cells, saved it. Later I realized none of my changes were in the CSV file. Turns out Apple saved it as some kind of other proprietary file. From now on I'll just open my files in VSCode, because that's easier than worrying about getting sucked into the Apple ecosystem.

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It sounds like you need to export instead. CSV export isn't under save because it doesn't retain all the details of the document (such as formatting). This behaviour is standard and can be seen in MS Excel, LibreOffice, etc. as well.

> CSV export isn't under save because it doesn't retain all the details of the document (such as formatting). This behaviour is standard and can be seen in MS Excel, LibreOffice, etc. as well.

Office warns me my changes will be lost and offers to change to XLSX. Numbers just changes it silently, without warning.

And I thought the Excel UX for this was annoying. Silently saving another copy of the file is terrible.

LibreOffice will happily re-save CSV in place. That's the only reason I have it installed! But Excel does require the same workflow as Numbers.

If you are concerned about retaining formatting in comma separated values, you have MUCH bigger prerequisite problems to figure out.

Opened it up in Numbers, changed a couple of cells, saved it. Later I realized none of my changes were in the CSV file. Turns out Apple saved it as some kind of other proprietary file.

Yes, the Numbers program saved it as a Numbers document.

Just like Excel saves Excel files.

That's why it's called "import," not "open."

When you pressed Save, a Save As dialog popped up asking for a name. If you had just saved it to the same file, there would be no Save As dialog. It wouldn't ask you for a name because it knew the name.

This is standard across every app on every Mac going back decades. I don't use Windows very often, but I believe it's the same there, too. You aren't asked for a filename if you're updating the same file.

It doesn't sound like an Apple problem, it sounds like you didn't pay attention, and when the computer did what you asked, you blamed the computer. There's nothing Apple or Microsoft or anyone else can do about that.

> Just like Excel saves Excel files

Not if, like the OP, you open a CSV file first, then hit save.

You're right, Excel does save back to CSV. It discards half your changes because they can't be saved in a CSV, modifies anything that could possibly be a date, and rounds random numbers, THEN it saves it as a CSV.

Before discarding non-compatible changes, it'll tell you, and offer to save as XLSX.

If you're just editing some values, you can save back to CSV with CTRL+S no problems.

No, you can't. It will import and re-export every cell, not just the one you modify. This includes interpreting dates and rounding numbers that exceed Excel's max value (instead of interpreting as a string)

They have a small banner at the top to warn about this, but it doesn't even address the things that were already lost the instant you opened it.

honestly though it's a csv file... think it's time for numbers to support it and do what the user expects.

Yeah this was the point I was trying to make. Obviously I didn't pay attention, but like...if I open a CSV file, my intuition tells me that if I click "save", it will save to the original CSV file. That's how most other programs work. Just because Excel also does it, doesn't make it a good idea. It's a bad idea and it's a hallmark of legacy software.

Numbers opens the CSV file, gives the user a screen to control import settings, and supports exporting as a CSV with custom delimeters.

Excel does save back to CSV. It discards half your changes because they can't be saved in a CSV, modifies anything that could possibly be a date, and rounds random numbers, THEN it saves it as a CSV.

Numbers makes this an explicit "Export" option because silently saving these types of changes is super dangerous.

You mean how it’s worked in every spreadsheet app that I’ve used since 1985?

Excel warns you and allows you to save it as a CSV. Still annoying but not as bad as it apparently works in Numbers.

I've also had this experience; it's a major UX fail. I uninstalled Numbers/Pages after it.

Excel will just silently modify everything and "save" it back as a CSV. I would rather that both Excel and Numbers only saved to CSV as an Export option.

Neither one is good, but at least Excel warns me formatting will be lost.

I wish they'd warn you on first operation that CSV can't handle, and ask.

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