676 lines
		
	
	
		
			24 KiB
		
	
	
	
		
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			676 lines
		
	
	
		
			24 KiB
		
	
	
	
		
			Plaintext
		
	
	
	
	
	
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Network Working Group                                         P. Deutsch
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Request for Comments: 1952                           Aladdin Enterprises
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Category: Informational                                         May 1996
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               GZIP file format specification version 4.3
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Status of This Memo
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   This memo provides information for the Internet community.  This memo
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   does not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of
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   this memo is unlimited.
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IESG Note:
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   The IESG takes no position on the validity of any Intellectual
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   Property Rights statements contained in this document.
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Notices
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   Copyright (c) 1996 L. Peter Deutsch
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   Permission is granted to copy and distribute this document for any
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   purpose and without charge, including translations into other
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   languages and incorporation into compilations, provided that the
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   copyright notice and this notice are preserved, and that any
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   substantive changes or deletions from the original are clearly
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   marked.
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   A pointer to the latest version of this and related documentation in
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   HTML format can be found at the URL
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   <ftp://ftp.uu.net/graphics/png/documents/zlib/zdoc-index.html>.
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Abstract
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   This specification defines a lossless compressed data format that is
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   compatible with the widely used GZIP utility.  The format includes a
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   cyclic redundancy check value for detecting data corruption.  The
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   format presently uses the DEFLATE method of compression but can be
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   easily extended to use other compression methods.  The format can be
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   implemented readily in a manner not covered by patents.
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 1]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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Table of Contents
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   1. Introduction ................................................... 2
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      1.1. Purpose ................................................... 2
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      1.2. Intended audience ......................................... 3
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      1.3. Scope ..................................................... 3
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      1.4. Compliance ................................................ 3
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      1.5. Definitions of terms and conventions used ................. 3
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      1.6. Changes from previous versions ............................ 3
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   2. Detailed specification ......................................... 4
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      2.1. Overall conventions ....................................... 4
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      2.2. File format ............................................... 5
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      2.3. Member format ............................................. 5
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          2.3.1. Member header and trailer ........................... 6
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              2.3.1.1. Extra field ................................... 8
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              2.3.1.2. Compliance .................................... 9
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      3. References .................................................. 9
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      4. Security Considerations .................................... 10
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      5. Acknowledgements ........................................... 10
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      6. Author's Address ........................................... 10
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      7. Appendix: Jean-Loup Gailly's gzip utility .................. 11
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      8. Appendix: Sample CRC Code .................................. 11
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1. Introduction
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   1.1. Purpose
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      The purpose of this specification is to define a lossless
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      compressed data format that:
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          * Is independent of CPU type, operating system, file system,
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            and character set, and hence can be used for interchange;
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          * Can compress or decompress a data stream (as opposed to a
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            randomly accessible file) to produce another data stream,
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            using only an a priori bounded amount of intermediate
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            storage, and hence can be used in data communications or
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            similar structures such as Unix filters;
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          * Compresses data with efficiency comparable to the best
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            currently available general-purpose compression methods,
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            and in particular considerably better than the "compress"
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            program;
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          * Can be implemented readily in a manner not covered by
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            patents, and hence can be practiced freely;
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          * Is compatible with the file format produced by the current
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            widely used gzip utility, in that conforming decompressors
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            will be able to read data produced by the existing gzip
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            compressor.
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 2]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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      The data format defined by this specification does not attempt to:
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          * Provide random access to compressed data;
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          * Compress specialized data (e.g., raster graphics) as well as
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            the best currently available specialized algorithms.
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   1.2. Intended audience
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      This specification is intended for use by implementors of software
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      to compress data into gzip format and/or decompress data from gzip
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      format.
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      The text of the specification assumes a basic background in
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      programming at the level of bits and other primitive data
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      representations.
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   1.3. Scope
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      The specification specifies a compression method and a file format
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      (the latter assuming only that a file can store a sequence of
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      arbitrary bytes).  It does not specify any particular interface to
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      a file system or anything about character sets or encodings
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      (except for file names and comments, which are optional).
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   1.4. Compliance
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      Unless otherwise indicated below, a compliant decompressor must be
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      able to accept and decompress any file that conforms to all the
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      specifications presented here; a compliant compressor must produce
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      files that conform to all the specifications presented here.  The
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      material in the appendices is not part of the specification per se
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      and is not relevant to compliance.
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   1.5. Definitions of terms and conventions used
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      byte: 8 bits stored or transmitted as a unit (same as an octet).
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      (For this specification, a byte is exactly 8 bits, even on
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      machines which store a character on a number of bits different
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      from 8.)  See below for the numbering of bits within a byte.
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   1.6. Changes from previous versions
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      There have been no technical changes to the gzip format since
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      version 4.1 of this specification.  In version 4.2, some
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      terminology was changed, and the sample CRC code was rewritten for
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      clarity and to eliminate the requirement for the caller to do pre-
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      and post-conditioning.  Version 4.3 is a conversion of the
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      specification to RFC style.
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 3]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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2. Detailed specification
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   2.1. Overall conventions
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      In the diagrams below, a box like this:
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         +---+
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         |   | <-- the vertical bars might be missing
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         +---+
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      represents one byte; a box like this:
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         +==============+
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         |              |
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         +==============+
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      represents a variable number of bytes.
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      Bytes stored within a computer do not have a "bit order", since
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      they are always treated as a unit.  However, a byte considered as
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      an integer between 0 and 255 does have a most- and least-
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      significant bit, and since we write numbers with the most-
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      significant digit on the left, we also write bytes with the most-
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      significant bit on the left.  In the diagrams below, we number the
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      bits of a byte so that bit 0 is the least-significant bit, i.e.,
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      the bits are numbered:
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         +--------+
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         |76543210|
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         +--------+
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      This document does not address the issue of the order in which
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      bits of a byte are transmitted on a bit-sequential medium, since
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      the data format described here is byte- rather than bit-oriented.
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      Within a computer, a number may occupy multiple bytes.  All
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      multi-byte numbers in the format described here are stored with
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      the least-significant byte first (at the lower memory address).
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      For example, the decimal number 520 is stored as:
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             0        1
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         +--------+--------+
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         |00001000|00000010|
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         +--------+--------+
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          ^        ^
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          |        |
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          |        + more significant byte = 2 x 256
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          + less significant byte = 8
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 4]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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   2.2. File format
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      A gzip file consists of a series of "members" (compressed data
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      sets).  The format of each member is specified in the following
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      section.  The members simply appear one after another in the file,
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      with no additional information before, between, or after them.
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   2.3. Member format
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      Each member has the following structure:
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         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
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         |ID1|ID2|CM |FLG|     MTIME     |XFL|OS | (more-->)
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         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
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      (if FLG.FEXTRA set)
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         +---+---+=================================+
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         | XLEN  |...XLEN bytes of "extra field"...| (more-->)
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         +---+---+=================================+
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      (if FLG.FNAME set)
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         +=========================================+
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         |...original file name, zero-terminated...| (more-->)
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         +=========================================+
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      (if FLG.FCOMMENT set)
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         +===================================+
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         |...file comment, zero-terminated...| (more-->)
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         +===================================+
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      (if FLG.FHCRC set)
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         +---+---+
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         | CRC16 |
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         +---+---+
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         +=======================+
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         |...compressed blocks...| (more-->)
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         +=======================+
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           0   1   2   3   4   5   6   7
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         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
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         |     CRC32     |     ISIZE     |
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         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 5]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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      2.3.1. Member header and trailer
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         ID1 (IDentification 1)
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         ID2 (IDentification 2)
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            These have the fixed values ID1 = 31 (0x1f, \037), ID2 = 139
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            (0x8b, \213), to identify the file as being in gzip format.
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         CM (Compression Method)
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            This identifies the compression method used in the file.  CM
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            = 0-7 are reserved.  CM = 8 denotes the "deflate"
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            compression method, which is the one customarily used by
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            gzip and which is documented elsewhere.
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         FLG (FLaGs)
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            This flag byte is divided into individual bits as follows:
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               bit 0   FTEXT
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               bit 1   FHCRC
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               bit 2   FEXTRA
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               bit 3   FNAME
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               bit 4   FCOMMENT
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               bit 5   reserved
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               bit 6   reserved
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               bit 7   reserved
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            If FTEXT is set, the file is probably ASCII text.  This is
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            an optional indication, which the compressor may set by
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            checking a small amount of the input data to see whether any
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            non-ASCII characters are present.  In case of doubt, FTEXT
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            is cleared, indicating binary data. For systems which have
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            different file formats for ascii text and binary data, the
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            decompressor can use FTEXT to choose the appropriate format.
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            We deliberately do not specify the algorithm used to set
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            this bit, since a compressor always has the option of
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            leaving it cleared and a decompressor always has the option
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            of ignoring it and letting some other program handle issues
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            of data conversion.
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            If FHCRC is set, a CRC16 for the gzip header is present,
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            immediately before the compressed data. The CRC16 consists
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            of the two least significant bytes of the CRC32 for all
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            bytes of the gzip header up to and not including the CRC16.
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            [The FHCRC bit was never set by versions of gzip up to
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            1.2.4, even though it was documented with a different
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            meaning in gzip 1.2.4.]
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            If FEXTRA is set, optional extra fields are present, as
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            described in a following section.
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 6]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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            If FNAME is set, an original file name is present,
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            terminated by a zero byte.  The name must consist of ISO
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            8859-1 (LATIN-1) characters; on operating systems using
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            EBCDIC or any other character set for file names, the name
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            must be translated to the ISO LATIN-1 character set.  This
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            is the original name of the file being compressed, with any
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            directory components removed, and, if the file being
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            compressed is on a file system with case insensitive names,
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            forced to lower case. There is no original file name if the
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            data was compressed from a source other than a named file;
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            for example, if the source was stdin on a Unix system, there
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            is no file name.
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            If FCOMMENT is set, a zero-terminated file comment is
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            present.  This comment is not interpreted; it is only
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            intended for human consumption.  The comment must consist of
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            ISO 8859-1 (LATIN-1) characters.  Line breaks should be
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            denoted by a single line feed character (10 decimal).
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            Reserved FLG bits must be zero.
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         MTIME (Modification TIME)
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            This gives the most recent modification time of the original
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            file being compressed.  The time is in Unix format, i.e.,
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            seconds since 00:00:00 GMT, Jan.  1, 1970.  (Note that this
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            may cause problems for MS-DOS and other systems that use
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            local rather than Universal time.)  If the compressed data
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            did not come from a file, MTIME is set to the time at which
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            compression started.  MTIME = 0 means no time stamp is
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            available.
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         XFL (eXtra FLags)
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            These flags are available for use by specific compression
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            methods.  The "deflate" method (CM = 8) sets these flags as
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            follows:
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               XFL = 2 - compressor used maximum compression,
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                         slowest algorithm
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               XFL = 4 - compressor used fastest algorithm
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         OS (Operating System)
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            This identifies the type of file system on which compression
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            took place.  This may be useful in determining end-of-line
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            convention for text files.  The currently defined values are
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            as follows:
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 7]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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                 0 - FAT filesystem (MS-DOS, OS/2, NT/Win32)
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                 1 - Amiga
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                 2 - VMS (or OpenVMS)
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                 3 - Unix
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                 4 - VM/CMS
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                 5 - Atari TOS
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                 6 - HPFS filesystem (OS/2, NT)
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                 7 - Macintosh
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                 8 - Z-System
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                 9 - CP/M
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                10 - TOPS-20
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                11 - NTFS filesystem (NT)
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                12 - QDOS
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                13 - Acorn RISCOS
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               255 - unknown
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         XLEN (eXtra LENgth)
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            If FLG.FEXTRA is set, this gives the length of the optional
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            extra field.  See below for details.
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         CRC32 (CRC-32)
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            This contains a Cyclic Redundancy Check value of the
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            uncompressed data computed according to CRC-32 algorithm
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            used in the ISO 3309 standard and in section 8.1.1.6.2 of
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            ITU-T recommendation V.42.  (See http://www.iso.ch for
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            ordering ISO documents. See gopher://info.itu.ch for an
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            online version of ITU-T V.42.)
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         ISIZE (Input SIZE)
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            This contains the size of the original (uncompressed) input
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            data modulo 2^32.
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      2.3.1.1. Extra field
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         If the FLG.FEXTRA bit is set, an "extra field" is present in
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         the header, with total length XLEN bytes.  It consists of a
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         series of subfields, each of the form:
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            +---+---+---+---+==================================+
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            |SI1|SI2|  LEN  |... LEN bytes of subfield data ...|
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            +---+---+---+---+==================================+
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         SI1 and SI2 provide a subfield ID, typically two ASCII letters
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         with some mnemonic value.  Jean-Loup Gailly
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         <gzip@prep.ai.mit.edu> is maintaining a registry of subfield
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         IDs; please send him any subfield ID you wish to use.  Subfield
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         IDs with SI2 = 0 are reserved for future use.  The following
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         IDs are currently defined:
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Deutsch                      Informational                      [Page 8]
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RFC 1952             GZIP File Format Specification             May 1996
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            SI1         SI2         Data
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            ----------  ----------  ----
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            0x41 ('A')  0x70 ('P')  Apollo file type information
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         LEN gives the length of the subfield data, excluding the 4
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         initial bytes.
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      2.3.1.2. Compliance
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         A compliant compressor must produce files with correct ID1,
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         ID2, CM, CRC32, and ISIZE, but may set all the other fields in
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         the fixed-length part of the header to default values (255 for
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         OS, 0 for all others).  The compressor must set all reserved
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         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]
 | 
						||
 |