User:Felix/ontology

• Abstract (XML, ASN.1) or concrete (HTML, PEM)?

By serialisation method

How does it encode the data it stores?

• Text-based
  • HTML-based (microformats)
  • JSON-based
  • XML-based
  • YAML-based
• Binary
  • ASN.1
  • bencode
  • BSON
  • EBML

By content type

What data is it capable of holding?

• Software
  • Machine code
    • Core dump
    • Executable
    • Shared object/dynamically-linked library
    • Object code
  • Bytecode
  • Programming language
  • Build automation scripts
  • GUI layout data
• Abstract data
  • Schema (XML DTD, XSD, SQL DDL, JSON Schema…)
  • Primitive value
    • Identifier (GUID, UUID, URI…)
    • Variable-length integers
  • Identification/metadata
  • Encapsulation/transfer encoding (base64, quoted-printable, percent encoding…)
  • Database
  • Abstract structured data (SGML, XML, bencode, JSON, RIFF…)
• File container
  • Archive (zip, tar, message/rfc822…)
  • Cryptography
    • Encrypted data envelope
    • Keys and certificates
    • Signature
  • General-purpose compression (gz, bzip2, xz…)
  • File system (FAT, extfs…)
  • Partition map (MBR, GPT…)
• Text and hypertext
  • Character encoding (UTF-8, ISO 8859, code pages…)
  • Markup language (TeX, HTML, RTF…)
  • Page layout (PDF, PostScript, dvi, DjVu, XSL-FO…)
• Multimedia
  • Audio
    • Waveform audio (WAV, mp3, FLAC…)
    • Instrumental audio (MIDI, MOD)
  • Media container (Ogg, Matroska)
  • Video and animation (MP4, GIF…)
  • Static graphics
    • Raster graphics (BMP, PNG, JPEG…)
    • Vector graphics (SVG, WMF…)
  • Fonts
    • Bitmap fonts (BDF, PCF…)
    • Outline fonts (sfnt)
  • Subtitles
  • Streaming manifest
  • Playlist
  • Game data

Some formats may fit several categories at once. SWF could fit in "Video and animation", "Multimedia container" and "Bytecode".

By use

How is it typically used?

• General-purpose
• Long-term archival
• Data interchange
• Internet/network messaging

Per-content type:

• Raster graphics:
  • Photographic
  • Pixel art
  • Scanned documents