How can I parse a CSV string with JavaScript, which contains comma in data?

Question

I have the following type of string

var string = "\'string, duppi, du\', 23, lala"

I want to split the string into an array on each

Answer 1

PEG(.js) grammar that handles RFC 4180 examples at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma-separated_values:

start
  = [\n\r]* first:line rest:([\n\r]+ data:line { return data; })* [\n\r]* { rest.unshift(first); return rest; }

line
  = first:field rest:("," text:field { return text; })*
    & { return !!first || rest.length; } // ignore blank lines
    { rest.unshift(first); return rest; }

field
  = '"' text:char* '"' { return text.join(''); }
  / text:[^\n\r,]* { return text.join(''); }

char
  = '"' '"' { return '"'; }
  / [^"]

Test at http://jsfiddle.net/knvzk/10 or https://pegjs.org/online.

Download the generated parser at https://gist.github.com/3362830.