±delete

Prevents one or more CSV columns from output

Description

This command ignores columns when reading (when input) or deletes them from output (when writing).
The most simple case is deleting just one unwanted field.
But you can also enter a list of fields to delete. In this case, it will is a comma-separated list of CSV column names (or numbers), and can even include column ranges denoted with a hyphen.
After the delete command, the respective column(s) are no longer accessible for subsequent commands.

Pattern

±delete[Fieldname] ±delete=[Fieldname] ±delete[AField],[AnotherField],... ±delete=[AField],[FirstOfMoreFields]-[LastOfMoreFields],...

Usage examples

This is the input file names.csv.

names.csv
City	FirstName	LastName	Birth	Driver License
Rome	Andrea	Bocelli	1958	y
Los Angeles	Lieutnant	Columbo	1927	y
London	Hercule	Poirot	1910	-
New York	Theodoros	Kojak	1922	y

csvfox names.csv -delete[FirstName] lastnames.csv

This removes the column FirstName. The resulting CSV table is written to lastnames.csv.

lastnames.csv
City	LastName	Birth	Driver License
Rome	Bocelli	1958	y
Los Angeles	Columbo	1927	y
London	Poirot	1910	-
New York	Kojak	1922	y

csvfox names.csv -delete[3],[4] firstnames.csv

This command removes the third and fourth column (LastName and Birth).

firstnames.csv
City	FirstName	Driver License
Rome	Andrea	y
Los Angeles	Lieutnant	y
London	Hercule	-
New York	Theodoros	y

csvfox names.csv -delete[FirstName]-[Birth] nonames.csv

This command removess a range of three columns (FirstName, LastName, and Birth).

nonames.csv
City	Driver License
Rome	y
Los Angeles	y
London	-
New York	y

Hint

This command is meant for removing one or a few CSV columns.
If you want to rearrange column output completely, or just write only a few of many columns, consider using ±columns instead.