Files and their headers?

Question

(I'm a dos guy , I always liked to view files in norton commander and see inside stuff etc)

however over the years I've noticed that each file(well , most of) ( binary files ) has header :

For example exe file has the MZ header :

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PGP file has also a header ;

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Pdf file has also a header ;

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ZIP file has also a header ;

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etc

So my question : is there any complete list of those headers ? where can i find it ?

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 15 '12 at 14:20

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On a Linux system the file /usr/share/misc/magic is the source for the magic.mgc file used by the file command. I doubt it's complete for every file type though.

The format of the file is described in the magic man pages.

answered Oct 15 '12 at 14:20

user9517

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score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 15 '12 at 14:18

1

There is no such complete list, because there is no central registry or authority for file headers. Any of these could be re-used by some new company with a new file format.

answered Oct 15 '12 at 14:18

mfinni

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IMHO - this has nothing to do with registry. those headers was much before event MS knew what is registry. it's more a stamp of a file. So I dont think there is a connection to windows shell extensions in regisrty. – Royi Namir Oct 15 '12 at 14:20
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I did not capitalize the word "registry", because I was not referring to the Windows Registry. If you want a public domain name that doesn't overlap with anyone else's, you have to purchase it from a domain name registrar. There is no such analogous organization for file headers. – mfinni Oct 15 '12 at 14:21
oh sorry. language barrier ...:-) – Royi Namir Oct 15 '12 at 14:22

Files and their headers?

2 Answers2