Talk:List of free file formats

Other free file formats?

• Does PNG fit here?
• Does DjVu fit here?
• Does Musepack (MPC) fit here?
• Does CSV fit here?
• Does Rich Text Format (RTF) developed by Microsoft, fit here?
• Does XPM fit here?
• Does MD3 fit here?
• Does MD5 fit here?
• Does BSP fit here?
• Does PAK fit here?
• Does OBJ fit here?
• Does ODT fit here?
• Does XLS fit here?
• Does DDS fit here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.254.89.228 (talk) 16:54, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
• JPEG (image format) is not an open format!!

SVG

SVG is a subset(?) of XML. Should it be listed?

That consideration does not disallow it. XML is way too general. I think it would make a good addition

PDF

PDF says it is proprietary. 24.210.73.62 21:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I am confused, the article says that it is a "proprietary file format" and then it says "PDF is also an open standard in the sense that anyone may create applications that read and write PDF files without having to pay royalties to Adobe Systems." hmm.. -- Frap 08:30, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Examples

We'll never be able to list all free file formats. Shouldn't we add a note to the top that they are just examples? 84.236.49.87 15:31, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure there are so many free file formats. There is always the {{Dynamic list}} template that could be added though... -- Frap 15:35, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, maybe "File format" is not well defined enough. But many programs have their own file format, and there is a great deal of free software out there. Even if you disallow private file formats which have only been used by one project. Perhaps if you exclude most plain text formats on the basis that they are either simple configuration files, programming languages, or subsets of a general markup language e.g. XML, you could get there... but I offer OFX, Vcard and Vcalendar as potential counterexamples. And Postscript (although I'm not sure about its openness) is a programming language, plain text as far as I know.

I don't think this article is very useful at the moment: a list does not an article make. I suspect theres a fair amount which could be said, potentially using the examples gathered so far.

Very good points. I think a distinction maybe ought to be made between several kinds of freeness and openness (and their interactions), in file formats particularly. There are many more distinctions than just free, open, and proprietary. The file format and decompression algorithm for RAR, for instance, are open, but the compression algorithm is proprietary. The JPEG compression method seems to be free, but various file formats containing JPEG information may be open (as the official JPEG file format) or proprietary (IIRC the JFIF format is an example). Likewise MPEG (MPEG-4 is open, but WMV and Quicktime are proprietary), AVI (the AVI container format is open, but some of the codecs are free) and contrarywise Ogg (I know of no technical reason preventing the use of WMV data within an Ogg container). There are proprietary XML DTDs. Many other examples could be found, or contrived for illustrative purposes. There's scope for a large article discussing this subject, I imagine. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 129.33.49.251 (talk) 19:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC).

More?

• CSV?
• CSS?
• XML: RSS, OPML, SVG, XHTML?
• TeX?
• SSI/SHTML ?
• tar?
• gzip RFC 1952
• XPM
• XBM
• PPM
• RSS (this is XML)

Open formats merge?

Shouldn't there be an explanation of how a free file format is different from an open format, if there is a difference? The incomplete lists on each article seem entirely redundant. Mike Linksvayer 21:59, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure where to draw the line or if there is much of a difference. But some formats have the specifications available so they're kinda "open" (?) or are they? either way, you're not allowed to implement them due to license or patents or stuff. I am not sure those constitutes as open formats... =/ -- Frap 22:22, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I think there is a difference: I have reworded the definition to reflect this. Ok? (see below under the reference to Free Software). Kim (talk) 11:42, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I suspect there will be redundancy/overlap: one could argue that free file formats are also open, but not all open file formats are free.

I don't think a merge is a good idea. The open formats page currently reads like an essay - there are no references to support the claim that the article's definition of "open formats" reflects the real world. This problem may be fixable, or maybe it's not. The meaning of the word "open" for a format is not evident. Publicly documented formats with mandatory patent royalties could be called "open", by the English language, but this would clash with the definition in that article. The "free file formats" article also has problems, but it may be a better base to start from. So I think it's best to keep this article, and in the future when one or both articles have progressed significantly, a merge could be looked at. --Gronky (talk) 21:33, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, the problem with merge might be pretty much the same like with Free and open source software.--Kozuch (talk) 12:30, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

I feel that it should be merged into Open standard--Pmedema (talk) 23:46, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, there is a difference. "Open standards" doesn't necessarily mandate "open process" nor reusability (e.g. CC licensing of specification). Free standards require both. -- samj _in^out 09:46, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

GIF

Patents for GIF are now expired. Can we treat it as 'free format'? JRS.pl 08:05, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Should have an implementation as Free Software to qualify as "free" format

The criteria lead to a confusion, just having no known patents (and there is no way to securly know that, btw) or the specs does not guarantee that this is a format that actually can be implemented. Requireing a Free Software implementation (and there could be more implementation of course, even in proprietary software) would be very good also to avoid the confusion that people associate "free" format with Free Software. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.217.158.46 (talk • contribs) 10:03, 1 July 2007

My comment is similar. I think the definition "A free file format is a file format that is free of any patents or copyright" is probably wrong. It could probably be defined along similar lines as the four freedoms of software (FSF) or free knowledge. Has anybody done this? // habj 08:57, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

A free file format is a file format whose full specification is available and for which there are no restrictions (e.g. legal or technical) on its use. Users may design and use variations that suit their needs, and contribute enhancements for potential incorporation into the next official release of the format.

Freedoms 0, 1 and 3 of the free software definition are covered by this definition. Freedom 2 is implicit in "full specification is available". Also implicit in this definition is that the development of free file formats is community participative process. Kctucker (talk) 11:35, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

It would be useful for someone to add Free protocol - along similar lines, including something like "... a protocol for which a legal Free Software reference implementation is available ...".

Comparisation of ...-formats articles

Besides a Comparison_of_audio_codecs, the same should be done aswell for the archiving formats, compression formats, video formats, ... and this all for their own category (lossless; lossy, ...). Please make the appropriate articles.

Thanks, 13:05, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Original research

Mostly missing reliable references.--Kozuch (talk) 11:04, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. The reference to the LINFO page doesn't qualify as a reliable reference either - LINFO is a project of the Bellevue Linux Users Group, not an independent and widely recognized standards body or news source. I haven't seen any widely acceptable definition for this sort of thing and I've been involved for decades. The analogy with software doesn't fly. And RTF is not free or open in any reasonable sense that I know of - it is a Microsoft publication copyrighted with "all rights reserved" and says that they may have patents etc. --NealMcB (talk) 03:47, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Open formats merge

Open format is no longer an original research (the article contains three authoritative definitions which include the more clearly defined open standard definitions), while these article lacks sources. I think that we can now merge the articles. --Nemo 06:58, 14 September 2009 (UTC)