# Obsolete Thor > Ramblings of a File Format researcher ## Posts - [MORE](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/12/05/more/): The main subject of these posts is about Obsolete software and file formats. I prefer to focus on older software titles and collect them when I can. I have also found older Macintosh software to be particularly interesting as many of the qualities of early Macintosh use is lost today. In researching a very early Macintosh title, I came across an article from 1999 written by the Washington Post, the article, now 26 years old, was already commenting about “antique” software which was less than 20 years old at the time. Is there a term for even more antique? The […] - [Textor](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/10/17/textor/): Many of us lived through the Word Processing Wars of the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. It was an overwhelming time of many options to choose from, each providing new features with each update, trying to become the leader in the word processing game. Early DOS versions had steep learning curves which built loyalty to those who committed to muscle memory all the key commands needed to produce the perfect document. With the many options to choose for word processing, brought just as many file formats to save your work. Many titles used the same file extensions or encouraged users […] - [ACE](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/09/12/ace/): Without divulging any youthful indiscretions, I recently was going back through some of my personal archives and came across a disc I burned around 2002 with some music stored on it. Normally I would find MP3 files, but in this case the file had a ACE extension. I remembered the format as an alternative to the common RAR or ZIP format often used to compress content for transporting (sharing) around the internet. I did what I normally do when something is compressed and reached for 7zip. But to my surprise, it threw an error. % 7z l sample.ace Scanning the […] - [Page Perfect](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/08/22/page-perfect/): The 1980’s was a time of growth in personal computing and one industry was progressing rapidly. Previously in order to get printed more than just words, you had to use a complex arrangement of type, masking, screening; all done by hand. Now with a personal computer you could design and print well designed layouts. There were many software applications who came on the scene in these early days. My personal favorite was QuarkXPress, I used the software in the early 1990’s and spent the next few years working in a commercial printshop using the software. What once took a team […] - [More Student Writing Center](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/08/08/more-student-writing-center/): Most of what you will find on this blog is file format identification. I see this as the first step in a longer process of preservation and ultimately access. Hopefully the analysis of some file formats can help make better decisions when needing to render the file in an emulator or migrate to another format. I don’t spend much time trying to parse the files I look at to understand the actual content, just enough to properly identify and differentiate between important versions of the format. One area I sometimes touch on, but often skim over is encryption. Many file […] - [Microstation](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/07/11/microstation/): I recently was able to image a few Bernoulli Disks for a collection using a SCSI device I have found quite useful. The disks had been sitting around for quite some time waiting for the right tools and resources to extract the contents. I mentioned the accomplishment to a few coworkers and one asked me if I would extract the contents from their old disk they used for school back in the 1990’s. They had spent a whopping $99 at the local bookstore for a disk which held a total of 150MB. Not GB’s like we are used to now, […] - [SCP](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/06/27/scp/): If you have been following previous posts about Floppy disk flux captures, you may have read about the HFE or A2R flux image formats. Both very useful in the preservation, archiving and emulation of old software and games stored on decaying and copy-protected floppy disks. I also built a Fluxengine which has come in handy more than once. It captures flux data in its own FLUX format. At work I also have access to a Kryoflux board which captures in separate RAW tracks. Today we are looking at the SCP format. I recently purchased a Greaseweazle for personal use and […] - [miniDVD](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/06/20/minidvd/): Let’s talk about the DVD format for a minute. Specifically the miniDVD media format. DVD’s are indeed versatile, as the name implies. You can find files on them written in many different filesystems, including digital video. DVD-Video is a video format which replaced VHS tapes as a main source of home movie entertainment. Eventually the public could afford to record their own video onto these discs and enjoy them for years. With the popularity of high definition video, DVD’s are not as popular as they once were, but still provide a decent experience. I often see the DVD-Video format in […] - [DaVinci Resolve](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/05/02/davinci-resolve/): A previous post was about LUTs, the little files needed to color grade your photo’s and video’s. One of the best systems for color grading video in use by professionals today is DaVinci Resolve. The system originally was all hardware based, but in the 2004 as computers were able to process higher quality video, da Vinci Systems released new digital systems. Like most professional multimedia editing software, projects are used to manage work and DaVinci Resolve is no different. Projects are generally where all the settings for the project are stored, but don’t generally store the actual media used in […] - [Scrivener](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/03/21/scrivener/): Word Processors are everywhere and have some of the most recognizable file formats. Some are very simple in that they just contain plain text, others are more complex. There are formats which allow for images and others which can handle different languages and writing directions. A writing platform I recently learned about is called Scrivener. It was first released in 2007 by a company called Literature & Latte Ltd, and has a Macintosh and Windows version. The software is marketed toward writers as there is some features that help with note taking, research and much more. It also allows for […] - [LUTS](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/02/28/luts/): If you are looking for LUTs, you’re in luck. There is a website for sharing your FreshLUTs. Even though they are fresh, they are probably not as exciting as one might think. LUTs are short for Look-Up Tables, which doesn’t sound as exciting as you were probably hoping. They are a pretty interesting process for dealing with color in high end Image and Video processing applications. Often called 3D Look-up Tables, they are used for color grading, an essential step in film production and restoration to map from one color space to another. LUTs are not to be confused with […] - [Camtasia](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/02/14/camtasia/): Not to be confused with Fantasia, a magical screen recording tool has been around for many years. Books have been written on the use of this software to instruct others on how to teach and demonstrate other software and ideas. Unlike Fantasia, the screen recording software Camtasia was not made by Disney, but does contain some proprietary data. Camtasia is a screen recording software by the developer TechSmith. First released in 2002, it was available first for Windows and much later, Macintosh. The first versions of Camtasia would encode screen recordings in an AVI container, using the TSCC codec. The […] - [Pro Tools Sessions](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2025/01/10/pro-tools-sessions/): One of the most important software titles related to professional audio recording and mixing is Pro Tools. The Digital Audio Workstation by Digidesign, now Avid, has been around since 1991 and was born from the very popular Sound Designer software first released in 1985. When Sound Designer II was released a few years later, the audio format used became the standard file format for audio recordings. Pro Tools progressed from there to become the industry standard for professional audio production, even winning a Technical Grammy, Emmy, and Oscar. Pro Tools helped produce amazing music for artists such as No Doubt, […] - [Script Writing](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/12/20/script-writing/): A few of you may remember a couple years ago reading in a Vice article about Eric Roth and his use of an old DOS only software program for writing all his Hollywood scripts. The Vice article was based on some earlier reporting in 2014 about his writing process. You can watch the full interview of Eric Roth on YouTube. I remember seeing a link to the Vice article a couple years ago and finding the screenwriters use of an old DOS program, Movie Master, funny and interesting. He says in his interview that out of half superstition and half […] - [CD Architect](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/12/13/cd-architect/): Receiving electronic media from an outside source can be an adventure. Often times you find yourself sorting the valuable files and separating them from the chaff. There can be hidden files, cache files, application files, drivers, and everything in between. Determining what formats are important can sometimes be difficult, especially if you don’t know the file format of some of the files. I was recently working on a collection of files which had been produced through some audio software. When working with audio, a WAVE file is what is usually kept as they contain the actual audio data. With these […] - [NCH Software](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/12/06/nch-software/): Recently I came across a piece of software which used dozens of extensions for a single file format. I find it hard to understand why a software developer would choose to use a new extension for every variation. It's all the same format, but makes #digipres more complicated. #fileformats #goodgrief pic.twitter.com/rz0IpK2i0j — Tyler Thorsted (@CHLThor) July 16, 2024 This T-Shirt Factory Deluxe files are a bit of an extreme, probably a prank against all of us doing file format identification. If you know who made this decision, I would like to have a chat. This is not first time I […] - [KODAK TIFF](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/11/29/kodak-tiff/): Years ago I bought my first digital camera. It was an Epson PhotoPC 3100z and I bought it because it could capture a digital image directly to a TIFF file. I don’t think most people would care about such a feature, but I thought it was awesome. Granted it filled up the small 32MB compact flash card pretty quick, I had to upgrade to a 512MB card, that set me back. TIFF images are pretty universal, they have a well known structure and have been around for a very long time. I have written about TIFF’s before, so I wont […] - [RealVideo](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/11/15/realvideo/): For #WDPD24 and PRONOM Hackathon week this year, I want to find some older formats listed which did not have a signature. There is a list to choose from, but I wanted to find something I hadn’t worked on before. I came across two entries for Real Video: PUID Name Extension fmt/204 RealVideo Clip rv x-fmt/277 Real Video rv I was familiar with Real Media and Real Audio, but had yet to come across any RealVideo with the RV extension. I thought it would be easy to find some references and samples, but that was not the case. I assume […] - [PAR](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/11/08/par/): Some file formats have a unique extension. Some formats use three character extensions which are well known, so its not common for them to be used with other software. Take the extension PDF for example, pretty sure no one else will use it as it is so well known. Other extensions often get reused by a few different software titles. There are plenty of titles which use the DOC extension. Part of defining a file format I come across is also defining other formats which use the same extension or the same basic patterns within the format. I want the […] - [Daisy](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/10/04/daisy/): A single file can often be self contained, having all that is needed to render itself with the correct software, but more and more often files need other files to function properly. Sometimes these groups of dependent files are within a container, such as a DOCX or ePub, but can also be found all sitting nicely in a folder. I say nicely, partly because the structure works, that is until they are treated as individual files and renamed or moved around breaking that interdependence on each other. In the case of many Apple bundle files, they appear to be a […] - [HFE](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/09/27/hfe/): Last week I had the pleasure of attending the 20th annual iPres conference on Digital Preservation in Ghent, Belgium. I enjoyed hearing from many of my respected colleagues on many aspects of preservation including one of my favorite topics, floppy disks. There was tutorials, lightning talks, and even a workshop, presented by Leontien Talboom, Elizabeth Kata, Chris Knowles, and myself. We titled the workshop “A Guide to Imaging Obscure Floppy Disk Formats“. The workshop was conceived by a mutual interest in imaging Wang 5.25in word processor disks, but expanded to include imaging of Amstrad 3in disks, 240K Brother Typewriter Disks, […] - [ATRAC](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/09/06/atrac/): The year was 2001 and I found myself in need of an audio player and recorder. I had been burning CD’s for a few years, making mixed CD’s was fun and convenient, but I needed more flexibility. After some research I decided on a device that was super popular outside the United States, but was gaining some loyal fans. This MZ-G750 MiniDisc device could record in a standard high quality mode through RCA, optical digital cable, and an optional microphone in mini-plug. This model also had the LP2 and LP4 modes which compressed higher, but could record up to 320 […] - [Worldox](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/08/23/worldox/): Most File Systems have unique ways for doing things, but also many things in common. On a Macintosh you might have some extended attributes, or that pesky hidden .DS_Store file no one really knows why it’s there. On Windows you may find a hidden thumbs.db file throwing off your file count. Hidden files are everywhere. Many have a real purpose, and that purpose may be insignificant or important in finding or giving context to other files. While processing a collection from a USB drive the other day, I came across a few files I hadn’t seen before. They were hidden […] - [A2R / MOOF / WOZ](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/08/16/a2r-moof-woz/): There seems to be a never ending growing list of disk image formats. Many have features which are specific to the media and format. If you have ever imaged an older Macintosh floppy you know they are special. If you add in copy-protection which many early Apple II floppies have, and you need special drives, hardware, and a special format to store the floppy data. When imaging special media, especially with unique media, it is best practice to image the floppies at the magnetic flux level. Floppy disks contain magnetic fluctuations which are measured and recorded using specialized equipment. A […] - [Binder](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/08/09/binder/): Microsoft is never in short supply of file formats. They have made many changes over the years. Introduced lots of products, some lasting longer than others. The list is quite long. One such software was called Office Binder. Introduced with Office 95, it was a companion application to combine a number of OLE objects together in one “Binder”. Meant to be the digital version of an Office Binder one often uses for presentations or proposals. You could add sections and include Word documents, Images, Powerpoint, Excel spreadsheets, basically any OLE object. Of course a Binder file itself was an OLE […] - [UFO](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/08/02/ufo/): Researching file formats isn’t for everyone. Others may find it boring or even odd. Trying to explain to others the nuances of a binary format versus a container format would bring many tears. Their reactions sometimes are similar to hearing someone explain their belief in aliens. Passionate, but a bit on the crazy side. from Imgflip Meme Generator So with aliens and containers on my mind, let’s take a look at a format with the extension UFO. It is not an unidentified flying object or a UAP, it may as well be an unidentified file object, but in this case […] - [ePic](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/07/05/epic/): Image compression has been around for awhile. It seems everyone took a crack at making better algorithms to improve quality and size. Some chose to invent new ways and others chose to use existing methods but with their own flare. Kodak tried this with their PhotoCD, but there was a couple other photo processing options that popped up in 90’s. One was Seattle FilmWorks and another was Konica PC PictureShow. Both of which used “proprietary” formats to deliver developed film on disk. Seattle FilmWorks later called PhotoWorks, used an image format with the extension SFW and was based on BMP […] - [FASTA & FASTQ](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/06/21/fasta-fastq/): There seems to be a never ending source of file formats out there. Documenting past obsolete formats, one would assume a point at which there are no more to find, but in reality more are re-discovered everyday by the Digital Preservation community. When it comes to more modern formats, it seems more are invented everyday, too many to keep up with identification. Document one, 10 more pop up, it seems never-ending. Such is the case for scientific formats, including sequencing formats. I was speaking with a colleague from another institution the other day and a file format was mentioned I […] - [Interactive Quicktime](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/06/14/interactive-quicktime/): One of my favorite legacy formats to explore is any type of multimedia CD-ROM. The 1990’s and early 2000’s were filled with all sorts of multimedia for CD, Web, and Television. It is also one of the most difficult formats to try and preserve for the future. Many CD-ROM’s are filled with executables and/or Macromedia Director media, later having flash content. The operating systems and security needs today make playback almost impossible. For this reason many have built emulation services to mimic the original operation system and software to allow the many historic multimedia CD-ROM’s to once again interact with […] - [SDIF](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/05/17/sdif/): I have used and have researched a lot of audio editing software. Some are very simple and straightforward, others are feature rich and take some time to learn. While looking in a format, I came across some Audio software which nothing like I have used before. At first I was confused, I figured it would be simple to open a certain file format and play the audio. Not so fast. Max is software which proudly says it is an, “infinitely flexible space to create your own interactive software”. Created by Cycling ’74 software, Max has been around for awhile, being […] - [PROmotion](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/05/03/promotion/): The 1990’s was an amazing time for multimedia. Compared to what is possible today, the graphics were more simple but there were many software titles leading the charge in Animation. Macromedia Director, along with Flash, dominated the interactive multimedia market for quite some time. Eventually being picked up by Adobe and discontinued in 2013. Quite a few multimedia disc’s out there were built using Director. Competing with Director, another company had a strong product. Motion Works International was an early pioneer in the multimedia CD-ROM scene. Rumor has it, Motion Works was started by a 12 year old. Motion Works […] - [Scheduling EXport](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/04/26/scheduling-export/): During a recent review of some help files for some older Final Draft software I came across this Q&A. Needless to say, I was intrigued, but let me give you a pro tip. Googling MovieMagic and “SEX” does not bring back results related to file formats. Also, probably best not to search at work. Movie Magic refers to software developed by Write Brothers/Screenplay. The main software, Screenwriter is a word processor built specifically for writing screen plays for TV, Movies, theater, etc. The software was first developed in 1983 and quickly replaced typewriters as the favorite for writing the very […] - [Sibelius](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/04/12/sibelius/): Music notation software is among the earliest software for desktop computers. SCORE in 1987, Finale came around in 1988, Capella in 1992, and Sibelius in 1993. Many others came and went during this time. Music notation software was so much more than the typical word processing or desktop publishing system. Specialized fonts were needed to display the music notation and there are many other variables for different instruments allowing individuals and others the ability to create complicated compositions in an inexpensive way. Sibelius [SI] + [BAY] + [LEE] + [UHS] was originally developed for the Acorn system in 1986, then […] - [Shorten](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/04/05/shorten/): I was recently going through some of my old CD-R’s and came across this 11 year old fun memory. I remember going to this 2003 Toad the Wet Sprocket concert in Salt Lake City with some friends, I had seen this band perform before, but this was the first time I was able to get a recording of the show. Normally having a recording of a concert of a well known band was a little shady, but for some bands, they not only allow recording of their live concerts, but they encourage it. There has been a few bands over […] - [Canvas](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/03/29/canvas/): When it comes to design software there were many options over the years, many being released with a lot of hype and others disappearing not long after they released. There are few which lasted long enough to not be gobbled up by big names such as Adobe. One of those is Canvas by Deneba Systems. First released in 1987, it is still available over at Canvas GFX. It’s amazing it was never bought by one of the big names, Adobe, Corel, Aldus, etc and remained under Deneba Systems until 2003 when it was bought by ACD Systems, but kept the […] - [MAGIX](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/03/22/magix/): There are probably many reasons why a software developer might want to create a proprietary format to store their files in. The software may require special features that don’t fit into an existing format. I would hope a developer would try to use existing formats, or even better open formats, but for many reasons, which probably include profits, they choose to re-invent the wheel often. MAGIX is a German company which started making software in 1994. In 2001 they developed their first video editing software which was called Movie Edit Pro. The software seems to be well received and is […] - [Designer](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/03/15/designer/): Micrografx / Corel Designer Many software titles we have all used began life under a different brand or even title. Larger software companies gobble up smaller developers, some brands merge, and others change names for whatever reason. Adobe has bought many smaller companies over the years, sometimes developing the acquired software and other times burying the software to avoid competition. Pagemaker was bought to give InDesign life, many Macromedia titles were incorporated or shelved. Such is life in the software world. In understanding a file format, often times you need to follow this trail backwards to understand when file formats […] - [Writing Center](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/03/08/writing-center/): In honor of #Marchintosh, I threatened in an earlier post to discuss The Writing Center, one of the many writing programs marketed by the Learning Company for the Mac. This one was developed by Datapak Software, Inc and I think they wanted to watch the world burn. This format was different enough from the Student Writing Center and the “Ultimate Writing & Creativity Center” to need its own post. Moreover, I am pretty sure the developers of this software were actively trying to frustrate anyone trying to document the format. Let me explain. In the early Macintosh world, very rarely […] - [Melco](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/03/01/melco/): I came across another CD-ROM the other day with some fun embroidery formats. It includes the HUS format I recently posted on, plus a few more. Like I mentioned before, this is a format genre which is not normally seen in the archival world, but is fun to take a peek into the world of embroidery formats. The HUS format from Husqvarna was a unique proprietary format, but looking at another in this set, we see a common container format. filename : 'CH1604.ofm' filesize : 25600 modified : 2002-04-29T05:58:26-06:00 errors : matches : - ns : 'pronom' id : 'fmt/111' […] - [PowerBI](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/02/23/powerbi/): I think when most of us have some data to sort or make sense of, we tend to gravitate toward a spreadsheet. Using Excel or LibreOffice, or if you really like to party, OpenRefine. There are plenty of meme’s out there representing the frustration people have with bugs, features and limitations of Excel specifically. There are more tools out there for making sense of data, one some people have access to is Microsoft’s more advanced PowerBI tool. Marketed as a Data Visualization tool it is accessible to many with a Office 365 subscription. It offers expanded features than excel and […] - [Compact Pro](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/02/16/compact-pro/): In the Classic Macintosh world back in the day it was important to use compression tools to keep files small and also allow you to send Macintosh files through the internet. Floppy disks could only hold a small amount of data so utilizing compression was a way to use the space effectively. I have already made posts on BINHEX and DiskDoubler which where also used for similar purposes. The most popular compression software for Macintosh is Stuffit, which used .SIT and .SEA extensions. One of the other often used tools was called Compact Pro. Compact Pro, originally know as Compactor, […] - [Finale](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/02/09/finale/): The amazing Ashley recently did a little writeup on the Sibelius music notation software. I thought I would take the opportunity to talk about another music notation software which needs a little update. Finale was created in 1987 for the Macintosh by a company called Coda Music and became quite popular with musicians and composers. The ability to use a computer to typeset a musical score was a huge advancement. This was all possible by the use of music notation fonts. Finale was originally written by Coda Music Technology, owned for a time by Net4Music, now currently owned by MakeMusic. […] - [SolidWorks](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/02/02/solidworks/): The Digital Preservation Coalition recently released their tech watch report on Preserving Geospatial Data. This adds to reports on CAD, Construction, and others. One of the many areas of difficulties in Digital Preservation is understanding these areas of GIS, CAD, and 3D Modeling software and the file formats which belong to the software titles in this space. Not only are the file formats plentiful but the software is extensive and expensive. Documentation is lacking in understanding the different file formats associated with each software title. These tech watch reports are super useful, but more is needed to enhance the tools […] - [AskSam](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/01/26/asksam/): I was recently asked to look at a set of files with the extension of .ASK. A quick little search led me to find they belong to AskSam which was a free-form database software often used by researchers and libraries as early as 1985. The first few versions of Access Stored Knowledge via Symbolic Access Method were released for DOS and later Windows. The company askSam Systems disappeared around 2015. The AskSam software competed with other personal information managers with unstructured data storage and retrieval. It was used to keep track of e-mail, special collections, letters, articles, web sites, etc. […] - [FlashPix](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/01/19/flashpix/): Is there a perfect raster image format? TIFF has been around quite some time and is generally accepted as a preferred preservation format. There have been a few attempts to have a single file contain multiple resolutions with the purpose of providing resolutions for different uses, lower-resolution for web and higher-resolution for print. Even the semi popular JPEG2000 added multiple resolutions to improve the JPEG format. Kodak came up with a few ideas to do this as well. The Kodak PCD, PhotoCD or Image PAC files was one that was used for awhile before it was abandoned. Another was FlashPix. […] - [Presto!](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/01/12/presto/): Working in preservation and archiving for the last few years has caused me to change a habit most people use everyday. The double-click. I am usually opening a file in a hex editor or control clicking on a file to open it in a different software application than is default. Maybe it’s just me, but having control over opening a file is essential. The thought of double-clicking on a file and the uncertainty of what is actually happening scares me a little. Of course opening an application executable requires a double-click or a right-click/open process and from there you can […] - [PNG Plus](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2024/01/05/png-plus/): Usually in the software world file formats are fairly efficient, the structure is meant to provide a way to store the data of the software being used. There isn’t much need to add additional unnecessary additions. This isn’t always true, but in the early days, disk space was expensive so compression and efficiency ruled. There also wasn’t much need to hide anything or complicate things. That is unless it is intended. This makes me think of two things, Polyglots and Steganography. Steganography is the art of embedding data within an image. With digital images you can hide another image within […] - [Picture It!](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/12/29/picture-it/): Most everyone has heard of Microsoft Office, the suite of applications used by millions everyday. Less people know about Microsoft Works, which was a lower cost alternative, but was quite popular as a home office suite of applications. One tool which often came with the Works suite was a digital image tool called Picture It! Picture It! was a photo editing tool first released by Microsoft in 1996 geared to making photo editing easy and affordable. Picture It! used a wizard type interface which walked you through acquiring an image and adding to it. One of the key features of […] - [Digital Negatives](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/12/22/digital-negatives/): One of the important parts about Digital Preservation is to gather significant properties of the digital files we hope to preserve. This can allow us to base our risk assessments off of more data than just an extension. For example, a TIFF file is a mighty good preservation format. Well documented and adopted by the preservation community, and with hundreds if not thousands of software tools to render and make use of the format. But if a TIFF file uses compression like LZW, or if it happens to have multiple pages, those are good things to know about. Most formats […] - [Final Cut Pro](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/12/15/final-cut-pro/): When it comes to Digital Preservation, the easiest types of file formats to preserve are often single self contained formats with lots of documentation. There are plenty of formats which break this norm, but a file format like a simple TIFF file is well understood and can stand on its own. The hardest file formats to preserve, I have found, are the complex under documented formats which often show up when you don’t expect them. There is a file format type which indeed makes things difficult. The project format. There are many software tools out there which generate a “Project”, […] - [PianoSoft DOM-30](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/12/08/pianosoft-dom-30/): I often find myself at a thrift store looking through the well used Compact Discs. Often see the same ones over and over, but occasionally finding a gem. While looking through a set of discs, a few caught my eye. When I pulled one out to look at the cover I noticed it was not your typical CD. Opening the cover I was greeted with a 3.5 floppy inside the jewel case. That was a fun surprise. The 3.5 inch floppy disk appears to be made specifically for the Yamaha Disklavier piano’s. The disk had the appearance of your typical […] - [Embroidery Formats](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/12/01/embroidery-formats/): There are certain file formats which seem to be fairly mainstream and come up frequently from a variety of sources. Then you find one from a specialized niche industry. I recently came across a file with the HUS extension and it led me down a path of a family of formats I didn’t know existed. The world of embroidery formats has been around for quite some time and is quite confusing. There are many manufacturers of embroidery machines and over the years have merged with each other or upgraded to include new features all requiring changes to the file formats […] - [RCA-VOC](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/11/24/rca-voc/): I wonder sometimes what goes through a software/hardware developers mind when deciding a format to use for a new device. There are so many options our there for audio formats to choose from. I am sure there are pros and cons to using one technology over another but it seems a few decide to go ahead and make their own. I am sure there is some commercial advantage to developing a proprietary audio format, but with all the established choices it seems unnecessary. Sony developed their own audio compression formats, which I explored in an earlier blog post. I came […] - [Adobe Acrobat Capture](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/11/17/adobe-acrobat-capture/): During the recent PRONOM Research Week, I noticed a file format with no description and no signature. x-fmt/217 Adobe ACD All I had to go on was it was an Adobe format and the acronym “ACD”. One of the first results that came up in a google search was a post in the Adobe forums with someone asking what to do with some old ACD and ACI files they found on a disc, circa 2000, labeled “Adobe Capture”. The only thing I remember about Adobe Capture was some scanning tools related to Adobe Acrobat, but I didn’t remember coming across […] - [Multiplan](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/11/10/multiplan/): This is a follow up post to the post “EARLY MICROSOFT EXCEL” earlier this year. I have to admit, often when I am researching file formats I can get distracted by a shinier format I come across. I often go down rabbit holes and forget the reason I started down the path I am on. I try and focus on the current needs in my life as a Digital Preservation Manager, but can get easily sidetracked. I always look forward to November every year so I can celebrate World Digital Preservation Day which sometimes comes along with a PRONOM research […] - [Composite File Management System](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/11/03/composite-file-management-system/): In honor of World Digital Preservation Day, I wanted to write a little about format headers, the magic that makes some files more easily identifiable than others. When it comes to binary file formats, some developers decide to make the format clearly identifiable in a header and others choose to make it ambiguous. Others have a little fun with leaving little clues and references to popular culture. A couple of my favorites based on their header. A couple of my current least favorites: Like I said some developers make it very obvious what software created the file format and others […] - [Apple Mail](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/10/27/apple-mail/): There really is no “Macintosh Format”, but there sure are a lot of formats you only find on the MacOS. From Resource Forks and iWork formats to unique sound formats, MacOS has them all! Majority of cross-platform software vendors have done a much better job in recent years in making their file formats the same across platforms, but for Apple, they love to make things unique, just for their platform. Take EMLX for example. Seems to be a trend to add “X” to the end of an older format to breath new life into it. The EML format, or Electronic […] - [Common Ground](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/10/20/common-ground/): If digital preservation had an extension it most likely would be .DP Unfortunately, it’s taken. Say hello to Digital Paper. In the early 1990’s, folks started to share documents with each other through the their phone lines. The early internet, BBS, AOL, CompuServe and the like allowed people to share ideas through applications like Word/WordPerfect Documents. Most people had a copy of the popular software and that software could open documents from their competitors, but fonts were always a problem. Technically a font is software as well and needs a license to be used. Also printers at the time dictated […] - [No bad deed....](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/10/13/no-bad-deed/): I had access to my first Macintosh computer around 1987. My father brought it home and I spent hours on it playing games and occasionally writing reports for school. The Macintosh Plus computer had one floppy drive and no hard drive. I remember playing the game Orbiter which had two floppy disks and right in the middle of game play it would pause and ask me to insert disk 2, then quickly ask for disk 1 again. The struggle was real. I spent years using many different Macintosh computers and now own more than I wish to admit. I’m preserving […] - [Quicktime MooV](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/10/06/quicktime-moov/): During the 1990’s Apple Quicktime became the dominant digital media standard. It is the basis for the MPEG-4 format which is used everywhere now. Technically the Quicktime Movie format is a container or wrapper which can hold a variety of Video and Audio streams. The basic unit of a Quicktime Movie is an atom. The MooV atom is the most important piece of a Quicktime Movie. Without it and the “mvhd” header atom, all the characteristics of the movie are lost. Having the MooV atom missing from your movie file seems like it would be a rare thing, but it […] - [BINHEX](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/09/29/binhex/): Working with files in todays world is much different than before. Today getting files back and forth from the cloud or through email is relatively easy, unlike the early days when we used FTP sites and needed to encode our data to properly transfer. I remember using an FTP program on my old Mac called Fetch. We had to determine if the content was to be transferred as text or binary. Picking the right encoding was critical to getting the content transferred correctly, this was even more critical when working with Macintosh files which needed a resource fork and/or finder […] - [Gone in a Flash](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/09/22/gone-in-a-flash/): This week I am at the annual iPres digital preservation conference. It is an amazing week of meeting colleagues and old friends who share the same passion of digital preservation. Outside of this community and my co-workers, talking about file formats and digital preservation usually bores people to death and I can hear some of them mumble under their breath, “nerd”! I term I am happy to accept. At the conference, which is in lovely Urbana-Champaign Illinois this year, I am trying to soak in all the amazing talks and conversations about the challenges facing our work. There were a […] - [TIFF](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/09/15/tiff/): Lets talk TIFF, or Tagged Image File Format. It is well documented and accepted by the community. The format has been around since 1986, first developed by Aldus as a image format for scanners. The TIFF format is now used worldwide as a preferred format for scanning and preservation of cultural heritage objects. As amazing as the format is, there are a few features of the format which can be a preservation risk. I want to focus on three of those risks. The Tagged Image File Format has a well known header: A TIFF file begins with an 8-byte image […] - [HighMAT](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/09/08/highmat/): Before the days of streaming and devices likeSmart TVs, AppleTV and Fire sticks, a few companies tried their best to come up with ways to make viewing your media on your TV mainstream. In a previous blog post I touched on the Kodak PhotoCD method, but there is one you are probably even less familiar with. HighMAT. HighMAT, or High-Performance Media Access Technology was a technology co-developed by Microsoft and Panasonic. You may have at one point owned a DVD player which had the technology built-in, but may have never used it. It came on the scene around 2002, but […] - [Apple Package Format](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/09/01/apple-package-format/): Let’s talk about Apple’s iWork software. Apple’s Office Suite of applications was first released in 2005 and provided a WordProcessor (Pages), Presentations (Keynote), and a little later, Spreadsheet (Numbers). They are exclusive to the Macintosh and iOS devices. iWork was released in a few different versions. They get a little confusing as each application has its own version which all seemed to unify and stabilize in 2020. Here is a matrix of major versions. Version Package or ZIP iWork ’05 Package iWork ’06 Package iWork ’08 Package iWork ’09 ZIP iWork 2013 Package iWork 2014 ZIP iWork 2019 ZIP iWork […] - [Student Writing Center](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/08/25/student-writing-center/): When it comes to difficult file formats, one of the more difficult groups of formats are word processing text files. Difficult for many reasons, one being the shear number of them, the other is their lack of identifiable headers. Just when you think you have seen them all another pops up to add to the mix. In a batch of other known word processing formats I came across a few files with no extension and with the following header: The rest of the file was binary so the only thing I had to go one was the string “TLC” and […] - [DiskDoubler](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/08/18/diskdoubler/): A few years ago I had someone contact me with a desperate plea. They had a disk which contained years of journal entries and letters to loved ones she could no longer access. She had used a Macintosh in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s to create all these files, but wanted to convert them all to PDF so she could make a book. She said she had tried everything, contacted a lot of people and her son had told her it was a lost cause. In talking with others at my institution, they knew I had a background in […] - [Shockwave Audio](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/08/04/shockwave-audio/): Ok, confession time. There is only a couple moments in my tech history which had a profound effect on me, enough to sear the memory of the moment into my brain. When I was in college around 1997 I had a decent CD collection and I had learned how to copy those AIFF files off the disc and use them on my trusty PowerCenter Pro. These files were huge, at the time. I knew a regular size song would take up around 50MB on my hard drive. This was a lot of space back in 1997, but I could then […] - [GEDCOM](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/08/04/gedcom/): One of the first PRONOM signatures I submitted was for a format I felt responsible for, considering where I worked. This is the GEDCOM format, which is an acronym for GEnealogical Data COMmunication. At the time I submitted the signature the format hadn’t been updated in years. Very recently it has seen a renewed interest from those in the Genealogical community. In 2021 the format was renewed with a Version 7 specification with the purpose of simplifying and clarifying the format. In addition a new format was released to handle storing multimedia files in a container called GED-ZIP. My first […] - [RIS Citation](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/07/28/ris-citation/): Up until recently I was working in a Corporate archive preserving all sort of content. The corporation throughout the years used many different software packages to produce all sorts of data. When I moved to an academic library I saw much of the same content, but there was a some new file formats which I needed to document and manage. Many of those come from scholarly journals , theses, dissertation, and data sets for projects. One format which I came across often but seems to be missing from the standard file format known lists was the RefMan citation format. This […] - [MP4 & 360](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/07/21/mp4-360/): Recently I have been exploring the MP4 format, more specifically the ISO Base Media File Format. It appears to be quite the versatile format. Based on the general Box/Atom format. Don’t mean to go much into the format here as there are so many formats which use this structure, like Quicktime MOV, Jpeg2000, to the more recent Canon RAW CR3. I have also been digging into the DASH MP4 format, but we’ll save that for a later time. One of the more interesting uses of MP4 lately is 360 or spherical video. They are becoming more and more popular with […] - [Beef & Babe's](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/07/14/beef-babes/): The 1990’s was a an exciting time for Desktop Publishing. I got my first taste of design in the early 90’s with Aldus PageMaker. QuarkXPress was king in commercial publishing world. For the most part designers and commercial printers used Macintosh computers which QuarkXpress catered to. For those who could not afford the high prices, or used a PC, there was a few options. Microsoft Publisher, TimeWorks Publish It!, and Express Publisher were a few. There was many debates during that time on which software was the best. I have submitted signatures to PRONOM for many of these: Express Publisher […] - [Hemera Photo-Object](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/07/07/hemera-photo-object/): Many years ago I dabbled in a little Graphic Design. Working for a commercial printer in the Pre-Press area, I was very familiar with all things graphics, but never had a great talent for design, especially drawing. I often needed the random clip art for a design I was working on, so I purchased the Hemera, The Big Box of Art, probably from my local CompUSA if that dates me. The cool thing about clip art from Hemera is it was not your usual JPG or TIFF format, it was in a special Photo-Object format. This format included the raster […] - [Image PAC Files](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/06/30/image-pac-files/): I wouldn’t be surprised if you have never heard of an Image PAC file. You may know it by the more common name Kodak Photo CD Image. Kodak’s PhotoCD format actually refers to the system and Disc format used to store images for compatibility with other hardware. The Kodak PhotoCD format was pretty advanced for its time, it original purpose was to store scanned 35mm film to a disc which was playable on computers and other hardware. In fact, because it was meant to store 35mm rolls as they were scanned it was the first use of the linked Multi-session […] - [JPG Structure](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/06/23/jpg-structure/): If you hadn’t been over to see the posters made by Ange Albertini, head over now. Below is his poster on the JPG image file format. This is the basic JFIF file format, which stands for JPEG File Interchange Format. There are also raw JPEG streams and Exif, Exchangeable Image File Format. The basic format is pretty straight forward. There is a start of image marker FFD8 some format information, then the raster compressed data, then an end of image marker FFD9. Identification of a JPEG file should be pretty straight forward. Knowing the start and end marker values and […] - [What's the 411?](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/06/16/whats-the-411/): I am dating myself by using the phrase “What’s the 411?” Back in my day (before the Googles), if you wanted quick information you could pick up the “land line”, a corded phone in your home which could only make phone calls, and dial 4-1-1 and you would be connected to an operator that could help you locate businesses, tell you the time, answer simple questions, and was infinity smarter than Alexa. Around the same time I was using 4-1-1 to answer all my questions, digital camera’s were just coming on the scene. One of those was the Sony Mavica […] - [Corel ArtShow](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/06/09/corel-artshow/): File extensions are the easiest way to quickly identify a file format, but they can be misleading. This is the reason in Digital Preservation format identification tools like DROID are important to look closer at the file structure to more accurately identify formats. The other complication is some extensions are used for more than one format. Extensions like .DOC or .ISO can be used with many formats. The PRONOM registry which DROID uses will list extensions associated with each format signature, but for some, they only have an extension and no signature. It’s nice to have an official ID to […] - [Universal Scene Description](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/06/02/universal-scene-description/): A few years ago I became obsessed with creating 3D models from physical objects. There was an app on my iPhone called 123D Catch by AutoDesk and it allowed you to take a series of photos with your iPhone camera, then combine them to create a 3D Model. This lead me down a path to eventually take a course on Photogrammetry and develop a process for capturing objects in our Museum. Autodesk eventually discontinued the app and built the technology into their paid products. This is when we started seeing lidar introduced with handheld devices. The first one I tried […] - [Embedded WAVE, thanks HP 👋](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/05/26/embedded-wave-thanks-hp-%f0%9f%91%8b/): Digital Preservation is all about identifying risks. This is done through a process which includes identification, validation, and metadata extraction. The more you know about the digital data you need to preserve over time, the more you can do to minimize those risks with the goal of making the data accessible over time. Many formats are pretty straight forward, they are identifiable through a header and then have some binary bits or plain text that is readable by certain software. Others are more complicated. A common practice for more complex needs is to use a container. Word processing programs started […] - [3M Printscape](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/05/19/3m-printscape/): There are some file formats out there which are confusing. One such file came across my desk awhile back. This file was not identifiable with any tools I threw at it. At first I believed it to be a TIFF file variant. You can see the TIFF header, but would not open as one, even if the extension was changed from PSC to TIF. The other hint was the phrase “3M Printscape”, I had never heard of it and there wasn’t much information available about it. It seems it was a creative product made by 3M in the early 2000’s. […] - [Greenstreet](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/05/12/greenstreet/): During the 1980’s and 90’s, there was an explosion of software created for the PC and Macintosh. When it came to graphic design, Aldus, Adobe, Quark, Serif, and a few others were clearly the best. That didn’t stop other software developers in trying their hand with publishing design software. If you were on a budget, there were plenty of options to choose from. One of them, Timeworks Publisher, was very popular. It was released in 1987 for IBM PC and Atari with later releases for Apple II and Macintosh. The name was later changed to Pressworks. It was published by […] - [LiveCode stack](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/05/05/livecode-stack/): One of the earliest hypermedia systems which predated the world wide web was called HyperCard on the Macintosh. Within minutes you could have a small application to do just about anything, calendar, address book, interactive books, games, etc. The internet archive has collected many HyperCard stacks and emulates them directly in the browser. Riding on the success of HyperCard was another hypermedia tool called MetaCard, which later became Runtime Revolution. Today it is known as LiveCode, a cross-platform application development system. LiveCode is often used to quickly create applications which can run on many platforms including iOS. It is popular […] - [Open Media Framework](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/04/28/open-media-framework/): Awhile back I was asked to look at a file in our repository which had the extension OMF. It was not identified by DROID and didn’t appear to be in PRONOM. It didn’t take long to find quite a bit of information on the file format as it was used by many important software titles, or at least it used to. Exploring the details of this file format led me on quite the rabbit hole. You see, the OMFI format is based on a container format that once was heralded as the a better open choice over the Microsoft OLE […] - [Sony Voice Recorder](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/04/21/sony-voice-recorder/): Sony’s IC Recorders have been a popular small digital voice recorder for many consumers. The current models all use common recording formats like Linear PCM WAVE files or MP3, but it wasn’t always so. One of the first models ICD-R100 would record to the ICS audio format, which was Sony’s original sound formats used on the IC Recorders. I am still looking for samples of this format. If you do have a need to convert this format, Sony has free converter software. The next generation of IC Recorders used a Memory Stick and therefore recorded audio to the MSV (Memory […] - [Early Microsoft Excel](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/04/14/early-microsoft-excel/): The first version of Microsoft Excel was released on Macintosh in 1985. Before that there was MultiPlan. MultiPlan version 4 and Excel version 2 used the well known and documented BIFF format. Before BIFF2 the formats are a bit of a mystery. AFAIK, Microsoft never released any documentation on the file format used for Excel version 1 and MultiPlan 1 -3, they emphasized using the SYLK format for interchange. To make matters worse, there were upwards of 100 different versions of the early MultiPlan, ported for dozens of different systems. Some of them are discussed on the TRS-80 website. Or […] - [Adobe Illustrator and PDF](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/2023/04/07/adobe-illustrator-and-pdf/): Adobe Illustrator is a power design tool. Originally released in 1987 for the Macintosh, it has been the vector design tool of choice for many professionals. Originally the Adobe Illustrator Format (AI) was based on postscript. With each file having a postscript header. This all changed with Illustrator version 9 moving to PDF as its core, released in the year 2000. Even though AI files begin with a PDF header, there is much more to them which makes them a unique file format. So as Dov Isaacs put it, “PDF files are not Adobe Illustrator files and vice versa”. Working in digital […] ## Pages - [Latest Posts](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/) - [About](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/about/): I work in Digital Preservation at a University Library. My background is in commercial printing and photography, but found archiving and file format research is my passion. You can find me usually on Twitter or digipres.club. You can find many of my file format edits on the File Format Wiki. Also checkout my GitHub for file format fun. - [File Formats](https://preservation.tylerthorsted.com/sample-page/) [comment]: # (Generated by Hostinger Tools Plugin)