Preferred Formats

Overview¶

Here is a list of file formats under consideration, some of which we consider preferred formats for archiving. See about for background.

Click on an entry for more information. Alternatively, use the navigation menu.

Concepts

A data type is a way of organizing raw data for specific modelling applications such as image, sound, text, structured data, etc.

A file format is a way to serialize the data of a specific data type to a file such as PDF, XLSX, SIARD, etc.

Applications that deal with that data are programmed in such a way that they can read one or more file formats for that type.

When data is written to file in a specific file format, the file name often gets an extension that indicates that file format such as .pdf, .xlsx, etc.

There are usually several file formats associated with one data type.

Legenda

icon	meaning
❎	not applicable
✅	yes
⚠️	under conditions
❌	no
❔	undecided

File format	Preferred ?	Extensions	Related	Data types
Access	❌	`.accdb`, `.mdb`	CSV, dbase, HDF5, SIARD, SQL, XML	Database
C	❎	`.c`, `.h`	CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
CPP	❎	`.cpp`, `.h`	C, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
CSS	⚠️	`.css`	CSV, HTML, JavaScript, JSON, JSX, Markdown, SGML, SQL, TeX, Text, XHTML, XML, XSLT, YAML	Markup, Text (plain)
CSV	⚠️	`.csv`, `.tsv`	Access, CSS, dbase, HDF5, HTML, JSON, Markdown, SIARD, SQL, TeX, Text, XML, YAML	Database, Text (plain)
dbase	❌	`.dbf`	Access, CSV, HDF5, SIARD, SQL, XML	Database
DOC	❌	`.doc`	DOCX, ODT, PDF/A	Text (formatted)
DOCX	✅	`.docx`	DOC, ODT, PDF/A	Text (formatted)
GIF	✅	`.gif`	JPEG, PDF, PDF/A, PNG, PostScript, SVG, TIFF	Image
HDF5	❌	`.hdf5`	Access, CSV, dbase, SIARD, SQL, XML	Database
HTML	⚠️	`.htm`, `.html`	CSS, CSV, JavaScript, JSON, JSX, Markdown, SGML, SQL, TeX, Text, XHTML, XML, XSLT, YAML	Markup, Text (plain)
JAVA	❎	`.java`	C, CPP, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
JavaScript	❎	`.es`, `.js`	C, CPP, CSS, HTML, JAVA, JSX, Markdown, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, SGML, TeX, XHTML, XML, XSLT	Markup, Program code
JPEG	✅	`.jpeg`, `.jpg`	GIF, PDF, PDF/A, PNG, PostScript, SVG, TIFF	Image
JSON	✅	`.json`	CSS, CSV, HTML, Markdown, SQL, TAR, TeX, Text, XML, YAML	Data (container), Text (plain)
JSX	❎	`.jsx`	C, CPP, CSS, HTML, JAVA, JavaScript, Markdown, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, SGML, TeX, XHTML, XML, XSLT	Markup, Program code
Markdown	✅	`.md`	CSS, CSV, HTML, JavaScript, JSON, JSX, SGML, SQL, TeX, Text, XHTML, XML, XSLT, YAML	Markup, Text (plain)
ODS	✅	`.ods`	XLS, XLSX	Spreadsheet
ODT	✅	`.odt`	DOC, DOCX, PDF/A	Text (formatted)
Pascal	❎	`.p`, `.pas`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
PDF	⚠️	`.pdf`	GIF, JPEG, PDF/A, PNG, PostScript, SVG, TIFF	Image
PDF/A	✅	`.pdf`	DOC, DOCX, GIF, JPEG, ODT, PDF, PNG, PostScript, SVG, TIFF	Image, Text (formatted)
Perl	❎	`.p`, `.pl`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
PNG	✅	`.png`	GIF, JPEG, PDF, PDF/A, PostScript, SVG, TIFF	Image
PostScript	❌	`.eps`, `.ps`	GIF, JPEG, PDF, PDF/A, PNG, SVG, TIFF	Image
Prolog	❎	`.p`, `.pl`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Python, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
Python	❎	`.p`, `.py`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Ruby, Scala, XSLT	Program code
Ruby	❎	`.rb`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Scala, XSLT	Program code
Scala	❎	`.scala`	C, CPP, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, XSLT	Program code
SGML	⚠️	`.xml`	CSS, HTML, JavaScript, JSX, Markdown, TeX, XHTML, XML, XSLT	Markup
SIARD	✅	`.siard`	Access, CSV, dbase, HDF5, SQL, XML	Database
SQL	✅	`.sql`	Access, CSS, CSV, dbase, HDF5, HTML, JSON, Markdown, SIARD, TAR, TeX, Text, XML, YAML	Data (container), Database, Text (plain)
SVG	✅	`.svg`	GIF, JPEG, PDF, PDF/A, PNG, PostScript, TIFF	Image
TAR	✅	`.tar`	JSON, SQL, XML, YAML	Data (container)
TeX	⚠️	`.sty`, `.tex`	CSS, CSV, HTML, JavaScript, JSON, JSX, Markdown, SGML, SQL, Text, XHTML, XML, XSLT, YAML	Markup, Text (plain)
Text	⚠️	`.cfg`, `.ini`, `.log`, `.lst`, `.text`, `.txt`	CSS, CSV, HTML, JSON, Markdown, SQL, TeX, XML, YAML	Text (plain)
TIFF	✅	`.tif`, `.tiff`	GIF, JPEG, PDF, PDF/A, PNG, PostScript, SVG	Image
WOFF	✅	`.woff`	WOFF2	Font
WOFF2	✅	`.woff2`	WOFF	Font
XHTML	⚠️	`.htm`, `.html`	CSS, HTML, JavaScript, JSX, Markdown, SGML, TeX, XML, XSLT	Markup
XLS	❌	`.xls`	ODS, XLSX	Spreadsheet
XLSX	✅	`.xlsx`	ODS, XLS	Spreadsheet
XML	⚠️	`.xml`	Access, CSS, CSV, dbase, HDF5, HTML, JavaScript, JSON, JSX, Markdown, SGML, SIARD, SQL, TAR, TeX, Text, XHTML, XSLT, YAML	Data (container), Database, Markup, Text (plain)
XSLT	⚠️	`.xsl`, `.xslt`	C, CPP, CSS, HTML, JAVA, JavaScript, JSX, Markdown, Pascal, Perl, Prolog, Python, Ruby, Scala, SGML, TeX, XHTML, XML	Markup, Program code
YAML	✅	`.yaml`	CSS, CSV, HTML, JSON, Markdown, SQL, TAR, TeX, Text, XML	Data (container), Text (plain)

If you are reading an archived copy of these docs

If you browsing the raw files, dataTypes contains a collection of data types and fileFormats contains a collection of file formats. and extensions contains a collection of file extensions.

All the content is preserved, but the formatting is just done by means of white space and by using Markdown formatting.