AI engineering glossary · Data engineering
What is CSV?
CSV (also called Comma-separated values): Comma-separated values, a plain-text tabular format where each line is a row and fields are split by a delimiter. It is universal and human-readable but carries no types, has quoting pitfalls and is slow and large at scale.
CSV: an example
A bank exports transactions.csv; a date like 03/04/2026 is ambiguous because the file does not say whether it is day-first.
Related terms
More Data engineering terms
- DAG
- Data catalog
- Data cleansing
- Data contract
- Data federation
- Data freshness
- Data governance
- Data ingestion
Where you learn it
CSV is part of the AI Engineering Program, which teaches it with notes, a hands-on lab and an exam. The first lesson is free.