Why is my table being saved in a wrong way in a CSV file?

I'm writing a program that creates a table and saves it in a .csv file using the writeTable command. When I print the table in the command window, it displays as I intended it to be, but when I open the .csv file, the table appears "misplaced", as if the program fails to recognize the field and data.

Here's the code for the program:

nct = 0; % NCT - Numero Catture Totali del DataSet. dI DEFAULT A 0
varTypes = {'string', 'string', 'string', 'double', 'double', 'string', 'double', 'double', 'string', 'double', 'double', 'string', 'double', 'double'};
varNames = {'User', 'Device', 'Move1', 'Start1', 'End1', 'Move2', 'Start2', 'End2', 'Move3', 'Start3', 'End3', 'Move4', 'Start4', 'End4'};
for n = 1:5 %Per ogni utente nel dataset
    for k = 1:4 %Per ogni cattura dell'utente
        nct=nct+1;
    end
end
sz = [nct 14];
movementDataset = table('size', sz, 'variableTypes', varTypes, 'VariableNames', varNames);
nct = 0; %Riporto nct a 0 per utilizzarlo nel ciclo for che segue;
for n = 1:5 %Per ogni utente nel dataset
    for k = 1:4 %Per ogni cattura dell'utente
        nct=nct+1;
        movementDataset{nct, 1} = n; %Nome utente
        movementDataset{nct, 2} = "Iphone 15"; %Device
        movementDataset{nct, 3} = "AAA AAA"; %Primo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 4} = 0; %Inizio Primo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 5} = 1; %Fine Primo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 6} = "EEE E E E"; %Secondo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 7} = 3; %Inizio Secondo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 8} = 4; %Fine Secondo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 9} = "c"; %Terzo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 10} = 6; %Inizio Secondo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 11} = 7; %Fine Terzo movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 12} = "D"; %Quarto movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 13} = 9; %Inizio Quarto movimento
        movementDataset{nct, 14} = 10; %Fine Quarto movimento  
    end
end
disp(movementDataset);
writetable(movementDataset, "movementDataset.csv");

And here's the .csv file

[Siddharth Bhutiya]

I just tried this on MATLAB online and it seems to load the csv file correctly. Could you attach the file. Also what platform (Windows, Mac, Linux) are you on?

[Stephen23]

"Also what platform (Windows, Mac, Linux) are you on?"

The most important question is: what delimiter does your OS' locale specify?

Answer 1

[Stephen23]

"Why is my table being saved in a wrong way in a CSV file?"

Why do you think that MATLAB is doing something wrong?

"but when I open the .csv file, the table appears "misplaced", as if the program fails to recognize the field and data."

MATLAB creates the CSV file correctly (it is a perfectly correct comma separated file).

The problem is that you are opening the CSV file (correctly encoded using delimiter commas) on a computer whose locale defines a semi-colon delimiter or some other delimiter character. Most likely because you speak a language that uses decimal commas, not decimal points.

You can either tell MATLAB to save using a delimiter character of your choice (e.g. semi-colon, see the DELIMITER option in the WRITETABLE documentation).

OR

you can tell your CSV-reading application to open it properly, e.g. by telling it that the CSV file uses a comma delimiter. For example, if you are opening the CSV file in MS Excel, create a new line at the very top of the file before all of the data and paste this text (and nothing else on that line):

sep=,

and then try opening the file again in Excel.

OR

you could change your locale settings to use a comma delimiter and decimal point.