# The Great Newline Schism

**URL:** <https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/the-great-newline-schism/123>\
**Category:** blog\
**Created:** [January 18, 2010, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/the-great-newline-schism/123 "2010-01-18T00:00:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![dtobias](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@dtobias](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/dtobias)\
**Post date:** [February 19, 2010, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/the-great-newline-schism/123/19 "2010-02-19T00:00:00Z")

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I actually use those ASCII file/unit/record separators on occasion in data storage and transfer formats used internally in my programs; they’re handy precisely because they’re so rarely used by anybody else, so they don’t clash with characters within the individual data items themselves as happens often with comma-separated data, and it allows a hierarchy of several levels of structure using the different characters.

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