| .gif |
graphic |
All web-based materials. All browsers can read
this format. |
GIF (Graphical Interchange Format), though not
the most economical, is the most common graphics format found on the Internet.
It is best suited for original artwork with few colours such as drawings,
buttons, and other screen components for your home page. GIF files support
transparency, interlacing (gradual image loading) and a 256 color palette
which can be decreased to reduce download times. |
| .jpeg |
graphic |
Use this format for photos displayed on the web. It handles
colour graduation better than GIF. Example photo saved as JPEG and as GIF. |
This is a true color format with excellent compression. Use
it to show photographs on your home page. The JPEG format supports both
progressive and non-progressive opening. We recommend you always use the
progressive options for your JPEG images because it starts to appear faster
and the file size is smaller. |
| .png |
graphic |
A good alternative to GIF but early version browsers
can't open these files. |
This format was developed as an alternative to the
GIF file format caused by proprietary concerns. It is an extremely versatile
format that offers good lossless compression for true color images, and
often better compression than the GIF format for indexed color. |
| .htm or .html |
text |
The text markup language used to create and display web pages. |
When you view a web page with sound, graphic or video, the
HTML controls where, when and how these media events unfold. |
| .au, .aiff, .wav |
audio |
Audio file types supported by recent versions of Explorer
and Netscape without special player. |
|
| .mp3 |
audio |
Fast becoming most popular audio format for the web. |
Need mp3 player software or plug-in to play these files or
multimedia player |
| .mpg |
video |
MPEG, the standard movie platform for the net. |
Need multimedia player |
| .mov |
video |
QuickTime Movie, Apple movie platform: Needs Quicktime multimedia player.
Click the play button to see the example on the right.
|
|
| .zip |
utility |
a common DOS/Windows compression format |
This is the format used to package
more than one file to email or transfer. Available
free. Included with Windows XP. |
| .sit |
utility |
Stuffit Archive, common Macintosh compression format |
Available
free. |
| .pdf |
document format |
Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format; used to package print
pages for reading and printing even if you don't own the application that
created the original file. A good format for creating a virtual library
of articles created in Word, PageMaker, or Quark Express. Unlike HTML, retains
the formatting and typefaces of the original text. |
You need to have the free Acrobat Reader to read .pdf files.
These files can be viewed in a web browser if you have Acrobat
Reader installed. .PDF
example. |
