A PlainSift practical guide
Clean a spreadsheet column before reusing it
Turn a copied spreadsheet column into a clean, unique list without changing its order.
A column copied from a spreadsheet can carry leading spaces, blank cells, and repeated entries into your next task. If you only need the cell values as a plain-text list, you can clean them in one pass. Start by copying the data cells in a single column, leaving out the header.
This recipe trims the edges of each line, removes empty lines, then removes exact duplicates. The order matters: trimming first makes “ Pear” and “Pear” match. Deduplication keeps the first surviving occurrence, so your original ordering is retained instead of being alphabetized.
Start with Trim linesFree, no sign-up. Your pasted text stays in the browser workspace.
Step-by-step instructions
These steps use the default options shown in each tool. Add changes in the order listed.
Trim lines
Paste the column into Trim lines. Leave the side set to both to remove leading and trailing whitespace.
Remove empty lines
Use Add another change, select Remove empty lines, and choose Add step. Keep the default whitespace-only setting.
Remove duplicate lines
Add Remove duplicate lines last. Leave case sensitivity on for this example, then select Run pipeline and review the result.
Review the full output, then use Copy result or Download .txt.
Before and after
Input
Pear
Apple
Pear
Banana
AppleResult
Pear
Apple
BananaSpaces at the edges disappear, the blank row is removed, and the later copies of Pear and Apple are dropped. Pear stays first.
Copy the result back into a column
Select Copy result, choose an empty destination cell in your spreadsheet, and paste. For simple one-value-per-line data, each line becomes a row. Keep the source column until you have checked the result. Removing blanks and duplicates changes the row count, so replacing just one column in a multi-column table can detach values from their neighboring records.
If you are cleaning a table with names, addresses, and other fields that must stay together, use the spreadsheet’s whole-row tools instead. PlainSift compares complete text lines; it does not know which spreadsheet column is a record key.
Decide what counts as the same value
The default keeps “Pear” and “pear” as different values. Turn off case sensitivity in the duplicate step only when capitalization should not distinguish entries. Internal spaces are still meaningful: “New York” and “New York” do not become the same value.
For identifiers, leading zeros and spacing can be significant. Review before trimming, and remember that the clipboard contains the spreadsheet’s copied representation, not its formulas or original import format. PlainSift cannot restore a zero that the spreadsheet has already discarded.
Common questions
Can I paste several columns at once?
Several copied columns usually contain tabs. Those tabs remain inside each line, and duplicate removal compares the entire line. This recipe is intended for one standalone column, not column-aware table editing.
Will a cell with an embedded line break stay together?
Not reliably. The workspace treats line breaks as item boundaries and does not parse spreadsheet clipboard quoting. Use a spreadsheet or a format-aware CSV tool for multiline cells.