File types you will meet

Jeremy Sanders

October 2011

Here is an inexhaustive list of typical file extensions. However file extensions are often not used or needed in Unix. Often the file command can give you useful information about a file.

  1. Library files (.a) - Archive files containing many compiled output (.o) files. Used for linking code to programs.

  2. AWK scripts (.awk) - Scripts written for AWK.

  3. LATEX bibliography files (.bib) - Files containing LATEX references.

  4. bzip2 (.bz2) - Files compressed using the bzip2 compression program.

  5. C source code files (.c/.h) - Files containing C source code.

  6. C++ source code files (.cc/.C/.CC/.hh/.h/.H/.cpp/.hpp) - Files containing C++ source code.

  7. csh/tcsh scripts (.csh) - Shell scritps written for the csh/tcsh shells.

  8. Data files (.dat) - Normally files containing binary data.

  9. MS Word documents (.doc) - Open in StarOffice or OpenOffice.

  10. DVI files (.dvi) - Output files the latex command makes from .tex files. Use xdvi to look at these files. Use dvips to convert these to postscript files.

  11. Encapsulated PostScript (.eps/.ps) - A subset of PostScript files which can be put into other documents (e.g. LATEX documents).

  12. Fortran source code (.f/.for/.f90./f77/.F) - The source code to a Fortran program.

  13. Fig format figures (.fig) - xfig figure.

  14. FITS image/data files (.fits, .fit, .FIT) - Files containg data or images in the FITS astronomical standard file format.

  15. GIF files (.gif) - Old GIF (Compuserve) compressed image files. Often found on the internet. GIF compression is loss-less. Use gimp/xv/firefox/mozilla to look at these. GIF files can be animated. Using PNG instead if possible (patent and size reasons).

  16. Gzipped files (.gz) - Files compressed by the gzip utility to make them smaller. Often you get two endings (e.g. .tar.gz is a gzipped tar file). Use gunzip to decompress these files.

  17. JPEG files (.jpg/.jpeg) - Image files compressed with the lossy jpeg format. These are often found on the internet. Use firefox/mozilla/xv/gimp to look at these files.

  18. Web-pages (.html/.htm) - Pages for viewing with a web browser.

  19. Makefiles (Makefile) - Files with a list of rules, typically saying how programs should be compiled.

  20. MP3 sound files (.mp3) - Files containing compressed sound or music.

  21. MPEG animations (.mpg/.mpeg) - Animations in the lossy MPEG format. Use convert to make these.

  22. Compiler output files (.o) - Files containing compiled code.

  23. OpenOffice documents (.odt, .odp, .ods, .odg) - OpenOffice/OpenDocument files.

  24. Perl scripts (.pl) - Scripts written in the Perl language.

  25. PNG files (.png) - PNG (Portable Network Graphic) lossless compressed image files. Often found on the internet. Use gimp/firefox/mozilla to look at these. Use these instead of the GIF format if possible. Usually smaller the equivalent GIF file.

  26. IDL programs (.pro) - Programs which can be run in the IDL environment.

  27. PostScript files (.ps) - Adobe PostScript files containing text/graphics to be printed. Use lp to print these files or gv to see them on the screen. Use convert/gimp to convert these to other image formats. Encapsulated PostScript files can be embedded in LATEX documents. Many ps files are encapsulated PostScript files.

  28. Python scripts (.py) - Scripts written in the Python language.

  29. Bourne Shell scripts (.sh) - Shell scripts written for the Bourne Shell (/bin/sh) or the Bash shell (/usr/local/bin/bash).

  30. Shared libraries (.so) - Program libaries which can be loaded at the time of running of a program.

  31. LATEX style files (.sty) - Files containing LATEX styles of documents.

  32. Tar files (.tar) - Archive files containing other files and directories. Use the gtar/tar command to decompress or make these files.

  33. LATEX or TEX files (.tex/.ltx) - Files containing LATEX or TEX source.

  34. Text files (.txt) - Files composed of normal characters - letters, numbers and symbols. Often these will be human-written and formatted into paragraphs.

  35. Compressed files (.Z) - Old compressed files (use gzip instead now). These files can be decompressed with gunzip.

  36. Zipped files (.zip) - Files containing other compressed files. Often found on Windows. Use zip/unzip to compress/decompress.

About this document ...

File types you will meet

This document was generated using the LaTeX2HTML translator Version 2008 (1.71)

Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, Nikos Drakos, Computer Based Learning Unit, University of Leeds.
Copyright © 1997, 1998, 1999, Ross Moore, Mathematics Department, Macquarie University, Sydney.

The command line arguments were:
latex2html -split 0 -font_size 10pt -no_navigation types_files.tex

The translation was initiated by Jeremy Sanders on 2011-10-02

Jeremy Sanders 2011-10-02