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title: Formatting Data Files 
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When you use the Greenplum tools for loading and unloading data, you must specify how your data is formatted. `COPY`, `CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE,`and `gpload` have clauses that allow you to specify how your data is formatted. Data can be delimited text \(`TEXT`\) or comma separated values \(`CSV`\) format. External data must be formatted correctly to be read by Greenplum Database. This topic explains the format of data files expected by Greenplum Database.

-   **[Formatting Rows](../../load/topics/g-formatting-rows.html)**  

-   **[Formatting Columns](../../load/topics/g-formatting-columns.html)**  

-   **[Representing NULL Values](../../load/topics/g-representing-null-values.html)**  

-   **[Escaping](../../load/topics/g-escaping.html)**  

-   **[Character Encoding](../../load/topics/g-character-encoding.html)**  


**Parent topic:** [Loading and Unloading Data](../../load/topics/g-loading-and-unloading-data.html)

