Input array is longer than the number of columns in this table. Exception

Question

I'm using Following code to read CSV file contents.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/l0zki3 link to download CSV file..

This is the CSV file which is located in my C:\ Drive.

The exception I am getting is "Input array is longer than the number of columns in this table". Why might this happen?

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Data;
using System.Drawing;
using System.Text;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.IO; //stremreader.. is frm.. System.IO.. .. 


namespace csvtodatagridview
{
    public partial class Form1 : Form
    {
        public Form1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }

        private void ShowData()
        {
            Boolean flg=true;
            string deli = ",";
            string tbname = "Booktb"; //dataset .. used 2 stored. then move dataset to .. grid..
            string filename = ("C:\\SharedIncidents.csv"); // path. plz keep the same path. .. 
            string str = Convert.ToString(System.DateTime.Now);

            DataSet ds = new DataSet();
            StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(filename); //Inputoutput .function 2 read.. file..

            ds.Tables.Add(tbname); //add 2 table.. 

            ds.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Date"); //specify. colum1 for datagrid1.
            ds.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Status" );//specify colum2 for datagrid2.
            ds.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Assignee" );
            ds.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Response" );


            string alldata = sr.ReadToEnd();

            string[] rows = alldata.Split("\n".ToCharArray());

            foreach (string r in rows)
            {
                string[] items = r.Split(deli.ToCharArray());
                ds.Tables[tbname].Rows.Add(items); 

            }

            int count = ds.Tables[tbname].Rows.Count;
            int index = 0;
            int currentindex = 0;

            for (index = 0; index < count; index++)
            {
                if (ds.Tables[tbname].Rows[index][0].Equals(str))
                {
                    flg = true;
                    DataSet ds1 = new DataSet();
                    ds1.Tables.Add(tbname);
                    ds1.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Date"); //specify. colum1 for datagrid1.
                    ds1.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Status");//specify colum2 for datagrid2.
                    ds1.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Assignee");
                    ds1.Tables[tbname].Columns.Add("Response");
                    currentindex = index;
                    while (currentindex < count)
                    {
                        DataRow row = ds.Tables["tbname"].Rows[currentindex];
                        ds1.Tables[tbname].Rows.Add(row);
                        currentindex++;
                    }
                    break;
                }
            }

            if (flg == false)
                Console.WriteLine("Date not matched");
            else
                this.dataGridView1.DataSource = ds.Tables[0].DefaultView;


        }

        private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            ShowData(); // call the abv function. . 
        }

    }
}

Answer 1

It sounds like your line contains an extra delimiter in it that is causing it to split that out into an extra column. Can you post a sample of the file to check that out.

EDIT: Yes after looking at your file I can see a number of extra commas in the response field that would be causing those to be split out. So either consider using a different character to split on or do a join on all the items in the array after the response column and manually add your items to the table.

Answer 2

Your "CSV splitting" is only splitting on commas, disregarding things like quotes. You're also

For example, here's a line from your file:

,frgv,gthbgtb,"be bm,k,"

Currently, that will be split into:

1. (empty string)
2. frgv
3. gthbgtb
4. "be bm
5. k
6 "

That's more strings than you want. The last three should all be one value, with commas in it. You'll need to make your parsing step smarter, stepping through the string and remembering whether or not it's in a quoted region. (Or use a third party library, as Marc suggested.)

Answer 3

Hard to answer without seeing the input data (or at least, a sample of it). However, it is not correct to assume that a "comma" in CSV means "next field"; the data might be quoted, for example:

123, "Gravell, Marc", 1324

I would recommend the CSV Reader from here, which gets this right.