spreadsheet format

[user at domain.invalid]

This not really a python question, but here it goes:

I have data with the format

	Name\Header	Header1	Header2	Header3...	HeaderN
	name1		4	5	6		6
	name2		5	6	4		3
         .
	.
	.
	nameN		6	56	6		1

My problem is if I email the data as plain text the formatting
is usually lost, especially when printing. So, I looked at
Comma Separated Values (CSV) and Data Interchange Format (DIF).
Finding The CSV format specifaction has been a mission, but
from what I gatherd the spec was to general. For instance,
the is no predifined value seperator, and there is no distinction
between text and number values. I am currently looking, at DIF,
but the doc I have is a bit cryption (at least for me). Besides
that, for interest sake, I creaded a DIF file with "gnumeric",
and that didn't open woth "open office" - to more accurate, the
data was empty.

In short, what would be the recommend data format for my needs?
I would prefare a format the is not platform or software
specific.


Any ideas?