'\n' gets ignored when creating a text file in JavaScript?

Question

I'm trying to create a text file with one string (called 'summary') as the only content. summary consists of many different lines, so I use '\n' quite a lot. However, the text file that gets created writes the string in a single line. Why do the '\n's get ignored?

This is the function I'm using:

 function writeToTxt(summary){
  var fileType = "text/txt";
  var fileName = Date.now()+".txt";

  var blob = new Blob([summary], { type: fileType });

  var a = document.createElement('a');
  a.download = fileName;
  a.href = URL.createObjectURL(blob);
  a.dataset.downloadurl = [fileType, a.download, a.href].join(':');
  a.style.display = "none";
  document.body.appendChild(a);
  a.click();
  document.body.removeChild(a);
  setTimeout(function() { URL.revokeObjectURL(a.href); }, 1500);
}

Thanks!

\n is a line break on *nix, but not on Windows. If you're looking at the file on Windows, that's probably why you're not seeing line breaks. For Windows it's \r\n. — T.J. Crowder
– T.J. Crowder, Commented Jan 2, 2018 at 11:23
What makes you think there are no line breaks in the file? How did you open it? — Bergi
– Bergi, Commented Jan 2, 2018 at 11:45
And, of course, you need to provide \n as part of a JavaScript string literal. Anything else (e.g. reading it from a text file) will not get it parsed. — Álvaro González
– Álvaro González, Commented Jan 2, 2018 at 11:49

T.J. Crowder · Accepted Answer · 2018-01-02 11:27:12Z

2

Your file creation code is fine, but \n isn't a line break on Windows (it is on *nix). If you're looking at the file on Windows, that's probably why you're not seeing line breaks. For Windows it's \r\n.

Your code works just fine for me on Windows if I use \r\n, and on *nix if I use just \n. (Many *nix tools will also handle \r\n line endings, what with there being so many Windows-like text files around...)

answered Jan 2, 2018 at 11:27

T.J. Crowder

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2 Comments

Bergi Over a year ago

Any decent editor should show \n as linebreaks on Windows as well.

T.J. Crowder Over a year ago

@Bergi: Yes. But people often seem to use Notepad instead. :-)

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