Format
Archiver Format
Summary
- Name
- Archiver Format
- Identifiers
- PUID: fmt/1835
- Format type
- Aggregate
- Description
- Archiver Format (.ar) is a non-compressed archive format associated with the archiver utility for Unix-style operating systems. It has largely been replaced by .tar for general archiving use, but persists in use for specialized applications involving statically-linked libraries for development. The format has never been standardised with modern archives based on a common format with two main variants - BSD and System V (previously known as COFF). There are other known past variants such as V6, V7, AIX (small), AIX (big) and Coherent.
- Note
- http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/AR https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ar_(Unix)
- File extensions
-
a - Source
- The National Archives and Records Administration / The National Archives and Records Administration
Internal signatures
Archiver Format
- Note
- BOF:'!<arch>' followed by 0x0A (Line Feed)
Byte sequences
- Min Frag Length
- Absolute from BOF
- Offset
- 0
- Max offset
- 0
- Byte Sequence
213C617263683E- Endianness
- None
Changelog
-
Added in V110
- Release date
- 14 March 2023
Archiver Format: Signature researched and samples provided by The National Archives and Records Administration.
Archiver Format: Full entry added. Submitted by The National Archives and Records Administration.