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			676 lines
		
	
	
		
			24 KiB
		
	
	
	
		
			Plaintext
		
	
	
	
	
	
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|  | Network Working Group                                         P. Deutsch | |||
|  | Request for Comments: 1952                           Aladdin Enterprises | |||
|  | Category: Informational                                         May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |                GZIP file format specification version 4.3 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Status of This Memo | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    This memo provides information for the Internet community.  This memo | |||
|  |    does not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of | |||
|  |    this memo is unlimited. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | IESG Note: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    The IESG takes no position on the validity of any Intellectual | |||
|  |    Property Rights statements contained in this document. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Notices | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Copyright (c) 1996 L. Peter Deutsch | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Permission is granted to copy and distribute this document for any | |||
|  |    purpose and without charge, including translations into other | |||
|  |    languages and incorporation into compilations, provided that the | |||
|  |    copyright notice and this notice are preserved, and that any | |||
|  |    substantive changes or deletions from the original are clearly | |||
|  |    marked. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    A pointer to the latest version of this and related documentation in | |||
|  |    HTML format can be found at the URL | |||
|  |    <ftp://ftp.uu.net/graphics/png/documents/zlib/zdoc-index.html>. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Abstract | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    This specification defines a lossless compressed data format that is | |||
|  |    compatible with the widely used GZIP utility.  The format includes a | |||
|  |    cyclic redundancy check value for detecting data corruption.  The | |||
|  |    format presently uses the DEFLATE method of compression but can be | |||
|  |    easily extended to use other compression methods.  The format can be | |||
|  |    implemented readily in a manner not covered by patents. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
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|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 1] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Table of Contents | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1. Introduction ................................................... 2 | |||
|  |       1.1. Purpose ................................................... 2 | |||
|  |       1.2. Intended audience ......................................... 3 | |||
|  |       1.3. Scope ..................................................... 3 | |||
|  |       1.4. Compliance ................................................ 3 | |||
|  |       1.5. Definitions of terms and conventions used ................. 3 | |||
|  |       1.6. Changes from previous versions ............................ 3 | |||
|  |    2. Detailed specification ......................................... 4 | |||
|  |       2.1. Overall conventions ....................................... 4 | |||
|  |       2.2. File format ............................................... 5 | |||
|  |       2.3. Member format ............................................. 5 | |||
|  |           2.3.1. Member header and trailer ........................... 6 | |||
|  |               2.3.1.1. Extra field ................................... 8 | |||
|  |               2.3.1.2. Compliance .................................... 9 | |||
|  |       3. References .................................................. 9 | |||
|  |       4. Security Considerations .................................... 10 | |||
|  |       5. Acknowledgements ........................................... 10 | |||
|  |       6. Author's Address ........................................... 10 | |||
|  |       7. Appendix: Jean-Loup Gailly's gzip utility .................. 11 | |||
|  |       8. Appendix: Sample CRC Code .................................. 11 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 1. Introduction | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.1. Purpose | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       The purpose of this specification is to define a lossless | |||
|  |       compressed data format that: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |           * Is independent of CPU type, operating system, file system, | |||
|  |             and character set, and hence can be used for interchange; | |||
|  |           * Can compress or decompress a data stream (as opposed to a | |||
|  |             randomly accessible file) to produce another data stream, | |||
|  |             using only an a priori bounded amount of intermediate | |||
|  |             storage, and hence can be used in data communications or | |||
|  |             similar structures such as Unix filters; | |||
|  |           * Compresses data with efficiency comparable to the best | |||
|  |             currently available general-purpose compression methods, | |||
|  |             and in particular considerably better than the "compress" | |||
|  |             program; | |||
|  |           * Can be implemented readily in a manner not covered by | |||
|  |             patents, and hence can be practiced freely; | |||
|  |           * Is compatible with the file format produced by the current | |||
|  |             widely used gzip utility, in that conforming decompressors | |||
|  |             will be able to read data produced by the existing gzip | |||
|  |             compressor. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 2] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       The data format defined by this specification does not attempt to: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |           * Provide random access to compressed data; | |||
|  |           * Compress specialized data (e.g., raster graphics) as well as | |||
|  |             the best currently available specialized algorithms. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.2. Intended audience | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       This specification is intended for use by implementors of software | |||
|  |       to compress data into gzip format and/or decompress data from gzip | |||
|  |       format. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       The text of the specification assumes a basic background in | |||
|  |       programming at the level of bits and other primitive data | |||
|  |       representations. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.3. Scope | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       The specification specifies a compression method and a file format | |||
|  |       (the latter assuming only that a file can store a sequence of | |||
|  |       arbitrary bytes).  It does not specify any particular interface to | |||
|  |       a file system or anything about character sets or encodings | |||
|  |       (except for file names and comments, which are optional). | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.4. Compliance | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       Unless otherwise indicated below, a compliant decompressor must be | |||
|  |       able to accept and decompress any file that conforms to all the | |||
|  |       specifications presented here; a compliant compressor must produce | |||
|  |       files that conform to all the specifications presented here.  The | |||
|  |       material in the appendices is not part of the specification per se | |||
|  |       and is not relevant to compliance. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.5. Definitions of terms and conventions used | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       byte: 8 bits stored or transmitted as a unit (same as an octet). | |||
|  |       (For this specification, a byte is exactly 8 bits, even on | |||
|  |       machines which store a character on a number of bits different | |||
|  |       from 8.)  See below for the numbering of bits within a byte. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    1.6. Changes from previous versions | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       There have been no technical changes to the gzip format since | |||
|  |       version 4.1 of this specification.  In version 4.2, some | |||
|  |       terminology was changed, and the sample CRC code was rewritten for | |||
|  |       clarity and to eliminate the requirement for the caller to do pre- | |||
|  |       and post-conditioning.  Version 4.3 is a conversion of the | |||
|  |       specification to RFC style. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 3] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 2. Detailed specification | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    2.1. Overall conventions | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       In the diagrams below, a box like this: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +---+ | |||
|  |          |   | <-- the vertical bars might be missing | |||
|  |          +---+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       represents one byte; a box like this: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +==============+ | |||
|  |          |              | | |||
|  |          +==============+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       represents a variable number of bytes. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       Bytes stored within a computer do not have a "bit order", since | |||
|  |       they are always treated as a unit.  However, a byte considered as | |||
|  |       an integer between 0 and 255 does have a most- and least- | |||
|  |       significant bit, and since we write numbers with the most- | |||
|  |       significant digit on the left, we also write bytes with the most- | |||
|  |       significant bit on the left.  In the diagrams below, we number the | |||
|  |       bits of a byte so that bit 0 is the least-significant bit, i.e., | |||
|  |       the bits are numbered: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +--------+ | |||
|  |          |76543210| | |||
|  |          +--------+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       This document does not address the issue of the order in which | |||
|  |       bits of a byte are transmitted on a bit-sequential medium, since | |||
|  |       the data format described here is byte- rather than bit-oriented. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       Within a computer, a number may occupy multiple bytes.  All | |||
|  |       multi-byte numbers in the format described here are stored with | |||
|  |       the least-significant byte first (at the lower memory address). | |||
|  |       For example, the decimal number 520 is stored as: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |              0        1 | |||
|  |          +--------+--------+ | |||
|  |          |00001000|00000010| | |||
|  |          +--------+--------+ | |||
|  |           ^        ^ | |||
|  |           |        | | |||
|  |           |        + more significant byte = 2 x 256 | |||
|  |           + less significant byte = 8 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 4] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    2.2. File format | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       A gzip file consists of a series of "members" (compressed data | |||
|  |       sets).  The format of each member is specified in the following | |||
|  |       section.  The members simply appear one after another in the file, | |||
|  |       with no additional information before, between, or after them. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    2.3. Member format | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       Each member has the following structure: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |||
|  |          |ID1|ID2|CM |FLG|     MTIME     |XFL|OS | (more-->) | |||
|  |          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       (if FLG.FEXTRA set) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +---+---+=================================+ | |||
|  |          | XLEN  |...XLEN bytes of "extra field"...| (more-->) | |||
|  |          +---+---+=================================+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       (if FLG.FNAME set) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +=========================================+ | |||
|  |          |...original file name, zero-terminated...| (more-->) | |||
|  |          +=========================================+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       (if FLG.FCOMMENT set) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +===================================+ | |||
|  |          |...file comment, zero-terminated...| (more-->) | |||
|  |          +===================================+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       (if FLG.FHCRC set) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +---+---+ | |||
|  |          | CRC16 | | |||
|  |          +---+---+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          +=======================+ | |||
|  |          |...compressed blocks...| (more-->) | |||
|  |          +=======================+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |            0   1   2   3   4   5   6   7 | |||
|  |          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |||
|  |          |     CRC32     |     ISIZE     | | |||
|  |          +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 5] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       2.3.1. Member header and trailer | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          ID1 (IDentification 1) | |||
|  |          ID2 (IDentification 2) | |||
|  |             These have the fixed values ID1 = 31 (0x1f, \037), ID2 = 139 | |||
|  |             (0x8b, \213), to identify the file as being in gzip format. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          CM (Compression Method) | |||
|  |             This identifies the compression method used in the file.  CM | |||
|  |             = 0-7 are reserved.  CM = 8 denotes the "deflate" | |||
|  |             compression method, which is the one customarily used by | |||
|  |             gzip and which is documented elsewhere. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          FLG (FLaGs) | |||
|  |             This flag byte is divided into individual bits as follows: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |                bit 0   FTEXT | |||
|  |                bit 1   FHCRC | |||
|  |                bit 2   FEXTRA | |||
|  |                bit 3   FNAME | |||
|  |                bit 4   FCOMMENT | |||
|  |                bit 5   reserved | |||
|  |                bit 6   reserved | |||
|  |                bit 7   reserved | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             If FTEXT is set, the file is probably ASCII text.  This is | |||
|  |             an optional indication, which the compressor may set by | |||
|  |             checking a small amount of the input data to see whether any | |||
|  |             non-ASCII characters are present.  In case of doubt, FTEXT | |||
|  |             is cleared, indicating binary data. For systems which have | |||
|  |             different file formats for ascii text and binary data, the | |||
|  |             decompressor can use FTEXT to choose the appropriate format. | |||
|  |             We deliberately do not specify the algorithm used to set | |||
|  |             this bit, since a compressor always has the option of | |||
|  |             leaving it cleared and a decompressor always has the option | |||
|  |             of ignoring it and letting some other program handle issues | |||
|  |             of data conversion. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             If FHCRC is set, a CRC16 for the gzip header is present, | |||
|  |             immediately before the compressed data. The CRC16 consists | |||
|  |             of the two least significant bytes of the CRC32 for all | |||
|  |             bytes of the gzip header up to and not including the CRC16. | |||
|  |             [The FHCRC bit was never set by versions of gzip up to | |||
|  |             1.2.4, even though it was documented with a different | |||
|  |             meaning in gzip 1.2.4.] | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             If FEXTRA is set, optional extra fields are present, as | |||
|  |             described in a following section. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 6] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             If FNAME is set, an original file name is present, | |||
|  |             terminated by a zero byte.  The name must consist of ISO | |||
|  |             8859-1 (LATIN-1) characters; on operating systems using | |||
|  |             EBCDIC or any other character set for file names, the name | |||
|  |             must be translated to the ISO LATIN-1 character set.  This | |||
|  |             is the original name of the file being compressed, with any | |||
|  |             directory components removed, and, if the file being | |||
|  |             compressed is on a file system with case insensitive names, | |||
|  |             forced to lower case. There is no original file name if the | |||
|  |             data was compressed from a source other than a named file; | |||
|  |             for example, if the source was stdin on a Unix system, there | |||
|  |             is no file name. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             If FCOMMENT is set, a zero-terminated file comment is | |||
|  |             present.  This comment is not interpreted; it is only | |||
|  |             intended for human consumption.  The comment must consist of | |||
|  |             ISO 8859-1 (LATIN-1) characters.  Line breaks should be | |||
|  |             denoted by a single line feed character (10 decimal). | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             Reserved FLG bits must be zero. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          MTIME (Modification TIME) | |||
|  |             This gives the most recent modification time of the original | |||
|  |             file being compressed.  The time is in Unix format, i.e., | |||
|  |             seconds since 00:00:00 GMT, Jan.  1, 1970.  (Note that this | |||
|  |             may cause problems for MS-DOS and other systems that use | |||
|  |             local rather than Universal time.)  If the compressed data | |||
|  |             did not come from a file, MTIME is set to the time at which | |||
|  |             compression started.  MTIME = 0 means no time stamp is | |||
|  |             available. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          XFL (eXtra FLags) | |||
|  |             These flags are available for use by specific compression | |||
|  |             methods.  The "deflate" method (CM = 8) sets these flags as | |||
|  |             follows: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |                XFL = 2 - compressor used maximum compression, | |||
|  |                          slowest algorithm | |||
|  |                XFL = 4 - compressor used fastest algorithm | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          OS (Operating System) | |||
|  |             This identifies the type of file system on which compression | |||
|  |             took place.  This may be useful in determining end-of-line | |||
|  |             convention for text files.  The currently defined values are | |||
|  |             as follows: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 7] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |                  0 - FAT filesystem (MS-DOS, OS/2, NT/Win32) | |||
|  |                  1 - Amiga | |||
|  |                  2 - VMS (or OpenVMS) | |||
|  |                  3 - Unix | |||
|  |                  4 - VM/CMS | |||
|  |                  5 - Atari TOS | |||
|  |                  6 - HPFS filesystem (OS/2, NT) | |||
|  |                  7 - Macintosh | |||
|  |                  8 - Z-System | |||
|  |                  9 - CP/M | |||
|  |                 10 - TOPS-20 | |||
|  |                 11 - NTFS filesystem (NT) | |||
|  |                 12 - QDOS | |||
|  |                 13 - Acorn RISCOS | |||
|  |                255 - unknown | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          XLEN (eXtra LENgth) | |||
|  |             If FLG.FEXTRA is set, this gives the length of the optional | |||
|  |             extra field.  See below for details. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          CRC32 (CRC-32) | |||
|  |             This contains a Cyclic Redundancy Check value of the | |||
|  |             uncompressed data computed according to CRC-32 algorithm | |||
|  |             used in the ISO 3309 standard and in section 8.1.1.6.2 of | |||
|  |             ITU-T recommendation V.42.  (See http://www.iso.ch for | |||
|  |             ordering ISO documents. See gopher://info.itu.ch for an | |||
|  |             online version of ITU-T V.42.) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          ISIZE (Input SIZE) | |||
|  |             This contains the size of the original (uncompressed) input | |||
|  |             data modulo 2^32. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       2.3.1.1. Extra field | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          If the FLG.FEXTRA bit is set, an "extra field" is present in | |||
|  |          the header, with total length XLEN bytes.  It consists of a | |||
|  |          series of subfields, each of the form: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             +---+---+---+---+==================================+ | |||
|  |             |SI1|SI2|  LEN  |... LEN bytes of subfield data ...| | |||
|  |             +---+---+---+---+==================================+ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          SI1 and SI2 provide a subfield ID, typically two ASCII letters | |||
|  |          with some mnemonic value.  Jean-Loup Gailly | |||
|  |          <gzip@prep.ai.mit.edu> is maintaining a registry of subfield | |||
|  |          IDs; please send him any subfield ID you wish to use.  Subfield | |||
|  |          IDs with SI2 = 0 are reserved for future use.  The following | |||
|  |          IDs are currently defined: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 8] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |             SI1         SI2         Data | |||
|  |             ----------  ----------  ---- | |||
|  |             0x41 ('A')  0x70 ('P')  Apollo file type information | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          LEN gives the length of the subfield data, excluding the 4 | |||
|  |          initial bytes. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       2.3.1.2. Compliance | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          A compliant compressor must produce files with correct ID1, | |||
|  |          ID2, CM, CRC32, and ISIZE, but may set all the other fields in | |||
|  |          the fixed-length part of the header to default values (255 for | |||
|  |          OS, 0 for all others).  The compressor must set all reserved | |||
|  |          bits to zero. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          A compliant decompressor must check ID1, ID2, and CM, and | |||
|  |          provide an error indication if any of these have incorrect | |||
|  |          values.  It must examine FEXTRA/XLEN, FNAME, FCOMMENT and FHCRC | |||
|  |          at least so it can skip over the optional fields if they are | |||
|  |          present.  It need not examine any other part of the header or | |||
|  |          trailer; in particular, a decompressor may ignore FTEXT and OS | |||
|  |          and always produce binary output, and still be compliant.  A | |||
|  |          compliant decompressor must give an error indication if any | |||
|  |          reserved bit is non-zero, since such a bit could indicate the | |||
|  |          presence of a new field that would cause subsequent data to be | |||
|  |          interpreted incorrectly. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 3. References | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [1] "Information Processing - 8-bit single-byte coded graphic | |||
|  |        character sets - Part 1: Latin alphabet No.1" (ISO 8859-1:1987). | |||
|  |        The ISO 8859-1 (Latin-1) character set is a superset of 7-bit | |||
|  |        ASCII. Files defining this character set are available as | |||
|  |        iso_8859-1.* in ftp://ftp.uu.net/graphics/png/documents/ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [2] ISO 3309 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [3] ITU-T recommendation V.42 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [4] Deutsch, L.P.,"DEFLATE Compressed Data Format Specification", | |||
|  |        available in ftp://ftp.uu.net/pub/archiving/zip/doc/ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [5] Gailly, J.-L., GZIP documentation, available as gzip-*.tar in | |||
|  |        ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu/ | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [6] Sarwate, D.V., "Computation of Cyclic Redundancy Checks via Table | |||
|  |        Look-Up", Communications of the ACM, 31(8), pp.1008-1013. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 9] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [7] Schwaderer, W.D., "CRC Calculation", April 85 PC Tech Journal, | |||
|  |        pp.118-133. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    [8] ftp://ftp.adelaide.edu.au/pub/rocksoft/papers/crc_v3.txt, | |||
|  |        describing the CRC concept. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 4. Security Considerations | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Any data compression method involves the reduction of redundancy in | |||
|  |    the data.  Consequently, any corruption of the data is likely to have | |||
|  |    severe effects and be difficult to correct.  Uncompressed text, on | |||
|  |    the other hand, will probably still be readable despite the presence | |||
|  |    of some corrupted bytes. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    It is recommended that systems using this data format provide some | |||
|  |    means of validating the integrity of the compressed data, such as by | |||
|  |    setting and checking the CRC-32 check value. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 5. Acknowledgements | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Trademarks cited in this document are the property of their | |||
|  |    respective owners. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Jean-Loup Gailly designed the gzip format and wrote, with Mark Adler, | |||
|  |    the related software described in this specification.  Glenn | |||
|  |    Randers-Pehrson converted this document to RFC and HTML format. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 6. Author's Address | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    L. Peter Deutsch | |||
|  |    Aladdin Enterprises | |||
|  |    203 Santa Margarita Ave. | |||
|  |    Menlo Park, CA 94025 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Phone: (415) 322-0103 (AM only) | |||
|  |    FAX:   (415) 322-1734 | |||
|  |    EMail: <ghost@aladdin.com> | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Questions about the technical content of this specification can be | |||
|  |    sent by email to: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Jean-Loup Gailly <gzip@prep.ai.mit.edu> and | |||
|  |    Mark Adler <madler@alumni.caltech.edu> | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    Editorial comments on this specification can be sent by email to: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    L. Peter Deutsch <ghost@aladdin.com> and | |||
|  |    Glenn Randers-Pehrson <randeg@alumni.rpi.edu> | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                     [Page 10] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 7. Appendix: Jean-Loup Gailly's gzip utility | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    The most widely used implementation of gzip compression, and the | |||
|  |    original documentation on which this specification is based, were | |||
|  |    created by Jean-Loup Gailly <gzip@prep.ai.mit.edu>.  Since this | |||
|  |    implementation is a de facto standard, we mention some more of its | |||
|  |    features here.  Again, the material in this section is not part of | |||
|  |    the specification per se, and implementations need not follow it to | |||
|  |    be compliant. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    When compressing or decompressing a file, gzip preserves the | |||
|  |    protection, ownership, and modification time attributes on the local | |||
|  |    file system, since there is no provision for representing protection | |||
|  |    attributes in the gzip file format itself.  Since the file format | |||
|  |    includes a modification time, the gzip decompressor provides a | |||
|  |    command line switch that assigns the modification time from the file, | |||
|  |    rather than the local modification time of the compressed input, to | |||
|  |    the decompressed output. | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 8. Appendix: Sample CRC Code | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    The following sample code represents a practical implementation of | |||
|  |    the CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check). (See also ISO 3309 and ITU-T V.42 | |||
|  |    for a formal specification.) | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |    The sample code is in the ANSI C programming language. Non C users | |||
|  |    may find it easier to read with these hints: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       &      Bitwise AND operator. | |||
|  |       ^      Bitwise exclusive-OR operator. | |||
|  |       >>     Bitwise right shift operator. When applied to an | |||
|  |              unsigned quantity, as here, right shift inserts zero | |||
|  |              bit(s) at the left. | |||
|  |       !      Logical NOT operator. | |||
|  |       ++     "n++" increments the variable n. | |||
|  |       0xNNN  0x introduces a hexadecimal (base 16) constant. | |||
|  |              Suffix L indicates a long value (at least 32 bits). | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       /* Table of CRCs of all 8-bit messages. */ | |||
|  |       unsigned long crc_table[256]; | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       /* Flag: has the table been computed? Initially false. */ | |||
|  |       int crc_table_computed = 0; | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       /* Make the table for a fast CRC. */ | |||
|  |       void make_crc_table(void) | |||
|  |       { | |||
|  |         unsigned long c; | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                     [Page 11] | |||
|  |  | |||
|  | RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |         int n, k; | |||
|  |         for (n = 0; n < 256; n++) { | |||
|  |           c = (unsigned long) n; | |||
|  |           for (k = 0; k < 8; k++) { | |||
|  |             if (c & 1) { | |||
|  |               c = 0xedb88320L ^ (c >> 1); | |||
|  |             } else { | |||
|  |               c = c >> 1; | |||
|  |             } | |||
|  |           } | |||
|  |           crc_table[n] = c; | |||
|  |         } | |||
|  |         crc_table_computed = 1; | |||
|  |       } | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       /* | |||
|  |          Update a running crc with the bytes buf[0..len-1] and return | |||
|  |        the updated crc. The crc should be initialized to zero. Pre- and | |||
|  |        post-conditioning (one's complement) is performed within this | |||
|  |        function so it shouldn't be done by the caller. Usage example: | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          unsigned long crc = 0L; | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |          while (read_buffer(buffer, length) != EOF) { | |||
|  |            crc = update_crc(crc, buffer, length); | |||
|  |          } | |||
|  |          if (crc != original_crc) error(); | |||
|  |       */ | |||
|  |       unsigned long update_crc(unsigned long crc, | |||
|  |                       unsigned char *buf, int len) | |||
|  |       { | |||
|  |         unsigned long c = crc ^ 0xffffffffL; | |||
|  |         int n; | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |         if (!crc_table_computed) | |||
|  |           make_crc_table(); | |||
|  |         for (n = 0; n < len; n++) { | |||
|  |           c = crc_table[(c ^ buf[n]) & 0xff] ^ (c >> 8); | |||
|  |         } | |||
|  |         return c ^ 0xffffffffL; | |||
|  |       } | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  |       /* Return the CRC of the bytes buf[0..len-1]. */ | |||
|  |       unsigned long crc(unsigned char *buf, int len) | |||
|  |       { | |||
|  |         return update_crc(0L, buf, len); | |||
|  |       } | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | 
 | |||
|  | Deutsch                      Informational                     [Page 12] | |||
|  |  |