.csv import creating black diamond with a question mark

[James Malgieri]

A .csv import is creatinga the black diamond with a question mark in place of the apostrophe & quotation marks.  I'm importing text into the Description field and a multi-text field. Looking at the .csv file, it seems these text blocks are not being surounded by quotes as I believed they would.

I am not going to search and every single quote ( ' ) with ( " ' " ).

Any ideas?

Jim

[Pete Singleton · Accepted solution]

The black question mark is when a character is unrecognised.  You need to select the right encoding before import.  I usually do the following before importing CSV:

1. Edit the file in Excel or whatever you are using
2. Save as CSV (not Windows CSV, the standard CSV)
3. Open in notepad
4. Select "Save As..." and make sure you choose encoding of UTF-8 instead of ANSI
5. Make sure UTF-8 is selected as the encoding when you import

[James Malgieri]

Hi Pete,

Thanks for your input.  I thought a ' and a ? would be recognizable, but oh well. Yes, I need to do exactly what you describe.

Jim