Forum OpenACS Development: List builder with .csv download and empty fields

I am trying to create a list builder that exports to .csv. I have been successful with that part, but i have a couple of fields that must be left blank that are not being exported with the rest of the data. Is there a way to force the empty fields to export? I am using display_template to force the column to show empty in the browser, but when it is exported to csv the column is gone in excel. also can the .csv file have the labels be the column headers? The .csv will be viewed in excel.

template::list::create \
-name monitor \
-multirow monitor \
-key empapp_id \
-elements {
empapp_id {
label "reqnum"
}
lname {
label "lname"
}
fname {
label "fname"
}
race {
label "race"
}
gender {
label "sex"
}
birthdt {
label "birthdt"
display_template " " #I would like this blank column to be exported to the .csv
}
datesubmitted {
label "appdate"
}
} -selected_format csv \
-formats {
csv { output csv }
}

db_multirow ...

template::list::write_output -name monitor

The key is that it needed to exist as a column in the multirow.

To change the headers you'd need to modify template::list::write_csv

Something like this

foreach __element_name $list_properties(display_elements) {
template::list::element::get_reference -list_name $name -element_name $__element_name
if {!$element_properties(hide_p)} {
lappend __csv_cols [csv_quote $__element_name]
lappend __csv_labels $element_properties(label)
}
}
append __output "\"[join $__csv_labels "\",\""]\"\n"