>We are trying to come up with a set of standards to use to send flat data files to third parties. Can somebody provide feedback on the standards we are leaning towards, or suggest other standards? The rules we have defined are pipe-delimited, .txt extension, header rows included, and an audit record on the first row. The audit record would be flexible, and would contain a record count (first column), and could contain zero, one, or many sums of columns. Here is an example:
>
>

>3|10.77|12
>ID|Product|Cost|Qty
>1|Widget|1.12|7
>2|Sprocket|2.65|3
>3|Gizmo|7.00|2
>

Mike,

(1) Why not xml as it is a standard

(2) I would add a header line that specifies the field separator - everyone free to select its own

(3) there must be a way to 'escape' the field separator in case there's one in the field content

(4) Why not EDI ? http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb226426.aspx
The UNA segment is optional, but you can specify one in the beginning of the file.
If not present, it defaults to a set of chars
If it is present, you can specify separators and the like. Important is UNA4 (Release indicator). That one is an escape char

ie, if the field separator is a pipe |, release indicator is ? and I have text with a pipe symbol in

1|Widget|1.12|7
1|Widget with ?| pipe symbol|1.12|7