Imagine that you receive mail from your friends or colleagues, and as an attachment they sent you some kind of document in the form of a file attached to the letter, which contains the information you need. You save this file to your computer, but you see that instead of the usual icons of any program (Word, Excel, PDF, etc.), there is no icon, and Windows thinks that this is some kind of file with an unknown format. Often this happens due to the fact that the file in the process of attaching to the letter by the sender (or when the file is saved to the recipient's computer) loses its extension, and the Windows operating system ceases to understand what type of file is in front of it, and therefore does not know which program you need to open this file. What is a file extension and how to display and hide them in various versions Windows, you can read in .
Second most common cause loss of a file extension is a careless renaming of a file when you have Windows set to display extensions of all known file types, and when you try to rename a file, you accidentally erase the file extension and end up with a document of unknown origin that you can no longer open with a double click of the mouse. For example, your file was called “Letter.doc”, which used to be easily opened with Word programs, and after the renaming it became known as "Letter at work". Note that the file no longer has the ".doc" extension that was accidentally erased when the file name was changed, and now this file will not be opened by double-clicking, but will try to ask you which program to open this file.
It's good if you know exactly what type of file is in front of you, and you can simply add the desired extension to it, for example, doc or xls, so that it automatically opens with a double-click on it. In a separate article, you can read about. But what if you have a file in front of you, the type of which you do not know? There are at least two ways to find out what type of file you have in front of you and give it the correct extension.
In this article, we will conduct an experiment - we will take several ready-made files different formats, which were discussed in the above article, we will erase their extensions as if they were lost or accidentally deleted, and try to find out what type each file is and what extension it needs to add in order to easily open it.
Several files will participate in our experiment:
- Bonnie Tyler - Turn around.mp3 - song in mp3 format
- bonus.mp4 - short video in mp4 format
- KeePass-2.28.exe - setup file KeePass programs (I will tell you about this wonderful program in one of the following articles)
- math.zip - zip archive
- Point Break.avi - short avi video
- Tulips.jpg - picture with tulips
- Report.ppt - presentation made in MS PowerPoint 2003
- Meeting materials.pptx - presentation made in MS PowerPoint 2007
- Letter.doc - text file made in MS Word 2003
- Order.docx - a text file made in MS Word 2007
- Application 4.rar - rar archive
- resolution.pdf - file in pdf format
- Correspondence table.xlsx - a data file made in the spreadsheet editor MS Excel 2007
- Tabular data.xls - a data file made in the spreadsheet editor MS Excel 2003
In the picture below, all files have their own extensions (highlighted with frames with red edges):
We delete all file extensions, and after that all the icons of programs with which you can open these files disappear. On Windows XP it looks like this:
In Windows 7, it looks a little different, but the meaning is the same - the operating system does not know which program to open these files.
Now when you try to open any Windows file prompts us to first select the program that needs to open this file:
And here we must be careful, because the wrong choice of program for of this type file will cause the file not to open, and the program will give an error, and the wrong association of the program for opening it will be assigned to this file.
Sometimes you can guess what type of file we have and what extension we should have by the name of the file. But we will take the case when it is impossible to do this.
So, we have a bunch of files with unknown formats and extensions, and we need to understand what these files are.
The first way to find out what type of file we have in front of us is to view the contents of these files using simple text editors, such as Notepad, or better, using the built-in viewers of various file managers, such as Total Commander or Far, or using the free advanced text Notepad editor++. I recommend that you download and install it, as it has many advantages over a regular notepad.
We take the first file “Bonnie Tyler - Turn around”, select Notepad ++ in the list of programs to open (if you haven’t installed it, use regular Notepad, but Notepad ++ is better, because when you open large files Notepad just freezes), and we see some bugs:
This should not be embarrassing, since to determine the type of a file, it is enough to look at the first line of the file's contents. Here you can see that the file begins with the letters "ID3".
So, remember that if inside the file its contents begin with " ID3", that is music file mp3 format, and it is this extension that needs to be registered to it. After specifying the extension, the file will be recognized by the system as a music file, and you can listen to it.
Open the second "bonus" file with the same Notepad++ program and look at its contents:
As you can see in the first line of the file content, it repeatedly mentions that this is an mp4 video file (highlighted in red in the screenshot above). And in general, if you see text inside the file like " ftypmp42“, then, as a rule, this is an mp4 video file.
Doing the same operation to view the contents with all other files, we get the following information:
- When you open the contents of the KeePass-2.28 file, you can see that the file starts with the letters MZ - this is a sign that we have an exe file in front of us.
- When you open the contents of the math.zip file, you can see that the file begins with the letters PK - this tells us that given file is an archive. Considering that Rar archives have a different entry in the file content, this is most likely a Zip archive, but be careful and pay attention to point 6 below.
- When opening the contents of the Point Break file, in the very first line we see a hint that we have an avi video file in front of us.
- When opening the contents of the Tulips file, we see two words that determine the file format - at the beginning of the line "yash" and then - "Exif". These words define the graphic format of the file, in particular jpg, and in this case we are sure that we have a picture file in front of us.
- Regarding the MS Office 2003 files “Report”, “Letter” and “Table Data” - all of them begin with “RP” in their internal content, so it is quite difficult to immediately determine which one was made in Word, Excel or PowerPoint. The only thing you can be sure of is that these files belong to one of the MS applications Office versions 2003 and below. Therefore, to open these types of files, you can use the enumeration of three extensions, starting with "doc", then "xls", then "ppt". Usually one of them will do.
- With the files "Materials for the meeting", "Order", "Correspondence table" is a little more complicated - since they are made in MS Office 2007 applications, they are essentially archives, and therefore at the beginning of their contents you will see the same letters as V Zip archive are the letters "PK". Nevertheless, further in the same line you can see the line .xml, it is she who will tell us that we have not just an archive, but a document from the MS Office series ", then "xlsx", then "pptx". One of them should fit.
- When you open the contents of the "Appendix 4" file, we see that it begins with the word "Rar" - this is the simplest indication that we have a rar archive in front of us.
- When you open the contents of the "resolution" file, you can see from the very beginning what kind of file it is, since it begins with the line "%PDF-1.3". The numbers may vary, but the abbreviation pdf is usually present and indicates the file format.
The second way to determine the file type requires an Internet connection, and it is also desirable that the file size be small, since we will use an Internet service to determine the file format.
We click on the “select file” button, specify our file for analysis (I will try to analyze one of the complex “Meeting Materials” files to see if this analyzer can cope and understand that this file was created in MS PowerPoint 2007 (in it had a pptx extension, and we removed it during our experiment.) After selecting the file, press the "Analyze" button and get the following result:
As you can see, the service determined with 97% probability that this is a PowerPoint file with the pptx extension. And since this file is also a container archive containing other files inside, the analyzer also indicated a 3% chance that it could be a zip archive.
Let's also try to check if this service can determine the type of our "resolution" file, in which we have deleted the pdf extension. We upload the file to the service, press the "Analyze" button and see that the service coped with the task perfectly:
As I said, the disadvantage this service it may be that in order to analyze the file, it needs to completely download it, and if you have a large file, then this process may take a long time, or even not reach the end at all. Therefore, with large sizes of unrecognized files, first try using the first method for determining its type, namely, viewing the contents of the file through file manager or editor Notepad++.
You can of course use special programs to determine the type of file, for example, File Type Verificator, but in my opinion, it will be much easier and faster to use one of the two methods proposed above.
So, dear visitors of the site, today we have discussed how you can determine the format (type) of a file if its extension has been lost. If you have any questions, please ask them in the comments to this article.
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a) files only; c) files and folders;
b) only other folders; G) Windows windows.
8. The folder in which all folders and files are stored is called:
a) main; c) main;
b) root; d) nested.
9. Name C: has:
a) a floppy disk drive; c) hard drive;
b) CD drive; d) file.
10. Which path from the root directory is correct:
a) A:\Tutorials\Field of Wonders\pole. exe;
b) \ Tutorials \ Field of Wonders \ pole. exe;
c) A: \ Tutorials \ Field of Miracles \;
d) A: Tutorials Field of Miracles.
11. Complete file name C:\DOC| PROBA. TXT. What is the name of the file?
A) PROBA; c) DOC\PROBA. TXT;
b) PROBA. TXT; d) TXT.
Option 2.
Horizontally:
1. Software, hardware and information means, uniting different kinds data into a single interactive environment.
2. Sound wave with continuously changing amplitude and frequency.
3. A program that compresses data.
4. Symbolic information.
5. Basic software.
6. Standard application - text editor.
10. Eliminate file fragmentation.
12. A specially written program whose main purpose is to harm a computer system.
Answers:
Horizontally:
1. multimedia; 2. sound; 3. archiver; 4. text; 5. systemic; 6. Notepad; 7. graphics; 8. installation.
Many computer users are familiar with the situation: They wanted to rename a file on a computer or flash drive. They deleted the old name, wrote a new one, and then a message: After changing the file name extension, this file may not be available. Are you sure you want to change the extension? Without looking, we agree, click Yes.
And that's it. The icon has changed. We are trying to open. Does not work. The system prompts you to select a program to open.
Why is this happening?
Quick reference: file name in operating system Windows consists of two parts separated by a dot. The first part is the file name itself, and the second part is the extension.
File extension indicates to the system the type of information stored in the file (music, text, picture, etc.) For example, Article.docx - here the file name is Article, and the extension is docx. After removing the extension, the system does not know how and with what to open such a file.
By default in Windows system the display of file extensions is disabled, so we only see the name. If you get a message when you try to rename or create a new file, it means that the display of file extensions was enabled in the settings.
How to fix?
Windows XP-7
To return the display of file names to your usual state, do the following steps:
1. Open any folder with files
If your file names show an extension, then proceed to the next step.
2. Menu Service select item Folder properties
Switch to tab View
Scroll down the list of settings and set the checkbox by clicking the left mouse button Hide extensions for known file types and press the button OK.
(Alternatively, you can click the button Restore defaults. In this case, all file and folder display settings will be returned to initial settings default).
Windows 8 - 10
IN latest versions Windows operating system, this can be done in the folder window on the tab View. Open any folder with your files. For example, downloads. Click on the tab View. In chapter Show or hide uncheck the box File name extensions(marked with a red arrow in the figure).
Hiding file extensions in Windows 10 The blue line shows the file extensions. They cannot be deleted. If you change the file name, the extension must be kept. It's easier to uncheck the box, as mentioned above. Then the renaming will be safe.
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The computer works with information, which can be textual, graphic, audio or video format. All information processed on a computer is stored in files.
The concept of a file is one of the basic concepts of computer literacy.
A file is a named area of memory computer media.
In other words, a file is a set of data on a computer medium ( HDD, CD and DVD disc, flash drive, etc.), which has its own name (file name).
File name
What characters can be used in a file name? It is recommended to use Russian and Latin letters, numbers, spaces and punctuation marks in file names. However, the file name must not begin with a dot, and must not include square or curly ( ) brackets in the name. The following service characters / \ | : * ? “< >
Is there a maximum length for a filename? The length of the file name must not exceed 255 characters. In fact, 20-25 characters are usually enough.
Windows does not distinguish between lowercase and uppercase letters for filenames. This means that it will not be possible to store files in the same directory whose names differ only by case. For example, two file names "Name.doc" and "NAME.doc" for Windows will be the same name for the same file.
File type
Do you think there can be several files in the same directory with the same name PRIMER? This is possible provided that the name PRIMER has different extensions.
File name extension points to file type(sometimes they say - format file). Thus,
- "file type",
- "file format",
- "file extension",
- “file name extension”
- it is, by and large, one and the same.
For example,
PRIMER.doc(x) - file type is word document(or a Word file)
PRIMER.bmp - the file type is a picture,
PRIMER.avi - the file type is a video file,
PRIMER.wav - The file type is an audio file.
All these files have different names (due to different file name extensions) and can be stored in the same place, i.e. in one directory. If we draw an analogy with the names of people, then the file name is the same as the name of the person, and the file name extension is the same as the last name of the person. Accordingly, PRIMER.doc and PRIMER.bmp by this analogy are the same as Ivan Petrov and Ivan Sidorov. Files named PRIMER.doc and VARIANT.doc are two brothers from the same document family (with the same .doc extension), just like, for example, Ivan Petrov and Fedor Petrov are brothers from the same Petrov family.
The file type (that is, the filename extension) is the part of the filename that begins with a dot followed by a few characters.
Types (extensions) consisting of three letters are common - .doc, .txt, .bmp, .gif, etc. Case does not matter, so .doc and .DOC are the same document extension, the same file type.
The extension is an optional attribute in the filename, meaning it may or may not be present. In this case, the dot is usually not put at the end of the file name. The extension, although not required, is still desirable, since it indicates to the Windows operating system the type of file.
Simply put, the file type is a clue to Windows which program should open the file. For example, the .doc extension indicates that the file should be opened using the Word editor, and the .cdr extension indicates that the file should be opened graphics program Corel Draw.
There are reserved (service) names that cannot be used as filenames, since they are device names:
PRN - printer,
COM1-COM4 - devices connected to serial ports 1-4,
AUX - same as COM1,
LPT1-LPT4 - devices connected to parallel ports 1-4 (usually printers),
CON (consol) - on input - keyboard, on output - screen,
NUL is an "empty" device.
Here are examples of filenames that are invalid:
5<>8/7.txt - characters "<», «>" and "/" are prohibited,
What's the question? - symbol "?" prohibited,
PRN.bmp - Here PRN is a reserved name.
Key points to know about file types
Depending on the file type, windows screen withdrawn various icons (icons). The first example concerns the icon text editor:
- the icon of the document processed by the Word editor and having the .doc extension.
The second example is for an archive file. This is the file that was processed using the WinRAR archiver (RAR for short):
– icon of compressed (archived) files being processed RAR archiver, and having the .rar extension.
Why can't I see file types in my Explorer?
Windows Explorer(Start-Programs-Accessories-Explorer) by default has a mode when name extensions (types) of files are not displayed on the screen, but icons (icons) of files are displayed.
Learn more about how to “force” Windows to show file types:
Selecting a file type when saving a file
When saving a file, it is enough to write its name and select the file type from the available list. The selected extension will automatically be added to the file name. For example, in the figure below, the program itself will add the .jpg extension to the file name. As a result, Windows will remember this file with the name "picture in paint.jpg".
When saving files, always pay attention to the "file type" line, if any, to avoid confusion. After all, the file type is a hint for Windows, with the help of which the system determines which program this file can be opened.
Close relationship between a file type and the program that opens that type
If you have downloaded a file from the Internet, for example, with the .rar extension, but you do not have an archiver program installed on your computer to work with such “compressed, archived” files, then do not be surprised that the file does not open. In other words, you must be aware that if you open files, for example, in video format, then the computer must have an appropriate program for working with this format.
An analogy can be drawn between a file (more precisely, between a file type) and a program that works with that type of file. The file is the lock, and the program that opens the file is the key to the lock. As you know, a lock without a key does not open, and a key without a lock is of no particular value.
Computer literacy exercises:
1) Try to create two folders on your desktop named PRIMER and primer.
To do this, on the desktop, right-click on free space, and in the window that appears - on the option "Create" and, finally, click on the option "Folder". Instead of the words " new folder» enter PRIMER. Then you repeat all this to create a second folder called "example". Did Windows give you the go-ahead to open a second folder?
2) Go, for example, to word editor and try saving the document with the name PRN. Windows allowed such a name for the new file?
3) How to solve the problem: “I download files from the Internet, but they are in the xsd (PM) / RAR format and cannot be opened or read on the computer. What to do?"
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F.I. __________________________________________ CLASS________ Option 1
1. The file system is:
A) a system program;
B) nested file structure;
C) nested folder structure;
D) nested folder and file structure
2. Which filenames are composed, right:
A) "example".doc ;
B) an example. doc
B) doc? Example;
D) example: doc ;
3. Specify the file extension “My portfolio. doc":
A) no extension
B) portfolio. doc
B) doc
G) . doc
4. Specify the Proba .html file type:
A) text
B) graphic;
B) web page;
D) executable.
5. Folder is:
A) a means of ordering thematically related files;
B) named area of the disk;
C) a program that translates a programming language into machine code;
D) a program that serves to connect input / output devices.
6. The folder can store:
A) files only;
B) only other folders;
C) files and folders;
D) Windows windows;
7. The folder in which all folders and files are stored is called:
A) main
B) root;
B) main
D) nested.
8. Name C: has:
B) CD drive;
B) hard drive
9. Which path from the root directory is correct:
A) A:\Learners\Field of Wonders\pole .exe ;
B) \Learners\Field of Wonders\ pole .exe ;
B) A:\Learning Programs\Field of Miracles\;
D) A: Field of Miracles students.
10. The full filename is C :\DOC │PROBA .TXT .What is the filename?
A) PROBA;
B) PROBA.TXT;
C) doc\PROBA.TXT ;
D) txt.
TEST ON THE TOPIC "FILE SYSTEM"
F.I. __________________________________________ CLASS________ Option 2
1. File is:
A) unit of measurement of information;
B) program c random access memory;
C) the text printed on the printer;
D) a program or data on a disk that has a name.
2. Which file names are correct:
A) example?.doc ;
B) example:txt ;
C) example text.doc ;
D) "example". doc
3. Specify file type s .exe
A) text
B) graphic;
B) executable
4. Specify the file extension disk .dat :
A) disk
B) disk.dat
B) date
D) no extension.
5. The file system is usually depicted as a tree, where "branches" are directories (folders), and "leaves" are files. What can be located directly in the root directory, ie. on the "trunk" of a tree?
A) files and folders;
B) only folders;
C) only files;
D) nothing.
6. The file type is indicated by:
a) file extension
B) file name;
C) the path to the file;
D) the name of the file.
7. A folder that is inside another folder is called:
A) main
B) root;
B) main
D) nested.
8. Name A: has:
A) floppy disk drive
B) CD drive;
B) hard drive
9. The full filename is C:\ DOC │PROBA .TXT .What is the filename?
A)C:\DOC\PROBA.TXT ;
B) DOC;
B) PROBA.TXT ;
D) txt.
10. What is the correct path to the 10a.txt file from the root directory:
A) C:\ My Documents\10a\10a.txt ;
B) My Documents\10a\10a.txt ;
C) C:\My Documents\10a\;
D) C: My documents 10a 10a.txt ;
