NationMaster - Encyclopedia: .nfo

.nfo (also written .NFO or NFO, a contraction of "info", or "information") is a commonly used three-letter filename extension of ASCII or extended ASCII text files that accompany other files and contain information about them. Such NFO files can be viewed with text editors or dedicated NFO viewers.^[1] They commonly also contain elaborate ASCII art. The ASCII codes for the word Wikipedia represented in binary, the numeral system most commonly used for encoding computer information. ... A filename extension is a suffix to the name of a computer file applied to indicate its type. ... Image:ASCII fullsvg There are 95 printable ASCII characters, numbered 32 to 126. ... The term extended ASCII (or high ASCII) describes eight-bit or larger character encodings that include the standard seven-bit ASCII characters as well as others. ... Notepad is the standard text editor for Microsoft Windows A text editor is a piece of computer software for editing plain text. ... ASCII art, an artistic medium relying primarily on computers for presentation, consists of pictures pieced together from characters (preferably from the 95 printable characters defined by ASCII). ...

Different kinds of files with the same NFO filename extension on Microsoft Windows PCs are data files associated with a Microsoft software tool called System Information. Generally speaking, these kinds of files are less often being referred to when "NFO files" are being mentioned. Windows redirects here. ...

Content of NFO files

NFO files usually contain release information about a software program. They are commonly associated with warez groups who include them to declare credit of and "bragging rights" over said release. Similarly they are often found in demoscene productions, where the respective groups include them for credits, contact details, and the software requirements. Warez refers primarily to copyrighted works traded in violation of copyright law. ... The demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes itself on producing demos, non-interactive audio-visual presentations, which are run real-time on a computer. ...

NFO files were common, and sometimes required, during the era of the BBS. A typical warez NFO file was elaborate and highly decorated, and usually included a large ASCII art logo along with software release and warez group information. The designers of these NFO files frequently incorporated extended ASCII characters from the then near-ubiquitous code page 437 character set in the file. BBS redirects here. ... ASCII art, an artistic medium relying primarily on computers for presentation, consists of pictures pieced together from characters (preferably from the 95 printable characters defined by ASCII). ... The term extended ASCII (or high ASCII) describes eight-bit or larger character encodings that include the standard seven-bit ASCII characters as well as others. ... IBM PC or MS-DOS code page 437, often abbreviated CP437 and also known as DOS-US or OEM-US, is the original character set of the IBM PC, circa 1981. ...

Before Windows 95 was introduced, NFO files also sometimes used ANSI-escape sequences to generate animated ASCII art (ANSI art). These animations, however, required ANSI.SYS to be loaded by the DOS shell. If the user's computer wasn't already configured to load the ANSI.SYS driver, viewing ANSI art required reconfiguring and rebooting. Because of this, ANSI art was much less common, and getting ANSI art to display correctly on a Windows 95 PC often proved more difficult, leading to a decline of such art in NFO files. Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. ... A screenshot of TheDraw editing an ANSI art picture of a shuttle; the purple text blinks ANSI art is a computer artform that was widely used at one time on BBSes. ... ANSI.SYS is a device driver in MS-DOS (and related operating systems) that provides extra console functions through ANSI escape codes. ... COMMAND.COM is the name for the default operating system shell (or command line interpreter) for DOS and 16/32bits versions of Windows (95/98/98 SE/Me). ...

As of 2008, NFO files can still be found in many ZIP archives. In modern day warez NFO files, a large ASCII art logo is frequently shown at the top, followed by textual information below. Instead of using the old code page 437 extended ASCII characters, modern ASCII art uses the current de-facto web standard ISO-8859-1/ISO-8859-15 or Unicode UTF-8 characters. The ZIP file format is the most widely-used compressed file format in the IBM PC world. ... ISO 8859-1, more formally cited as ISO/IEC 8859-1 or less formally as Latin-1, is part 1 of ISO/IEC 8859, a standard character encoding defined by ISO. It encodes what it refers to as Latin alphabet no. ... ISO 8859-15, also known as Latin-9, and unofficially as Latin-0 but not as Latin-15, is part 15 of ISO 8859, a standard character encoding defined by ISO. It encodes characters as 8 bits and can be used to represent the alphabet and other important characters for... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ... UTF-8 (8-bit UCS/Unicode Transformation Format) is a variable-length character encoding for Unicode. ...

Compatibility problems

Because the once-ubiquitous ASCII code page 437 was never common on the World Wide Web and is poorly supported by most (as of 2007) modern computers, older NFO files are frequently rendered incorrectly in modern web browsers and on modern operating systems (which mostly no longer use code page 437). To display old NFO files as intended, a dedicated CP437-capable viewing software is often required. IBM PC or MS-DOS code page 437, often abbreviated CP437 and also known as DOS-US or OEM-US, is the original character set of the IBM PC, circa 1981. ... WWWs historical logo designed by Robert Cailliau The World Wide Web (commonly shortened to the Web) is a system of interlinked, hypertext documents accessed via the Internet. ... A web browser is a software package that enables a user to display and interact with documents hosted by web servers. ... An operating system (OS) is the software that manages the sharing of the resources of a computer and provides programmers with an interface used to access those resources. ...

An added problem lies in the fact that many modern web browsers and text editing programs often use proportional fonts, whereas the ASCII art included in both old and new NFO files is heavily dependent on the file being viewed with a fixed width font. As a workaround on Windows OSes, simply using Windows Notepad and selecting the Terminal font may, in the absence of incompatible extended ASCII characters, sometimes be sufficient. In this case, the only difference might be that the text will be black on a white background in Notepad (rather than white on a black background as seen when viewing in MS-DOS), thus making some of the art appear to be "inverse", like a film negative. Vim is a text editor for Unix, Linux and Microsoft Windows A text editor is a type of program used for editing plain text files. ... In typography, a typeface is a co-ordinated set of character designs, which usually comprises an alphabet of letters, a set of numerals and a set of punctuation marks. ... In typography, a typeface is a co-ordinated set of character designs, which usually comprises an alphabet of letters, a set of numerals and a set of punctuation marks. ... For the item of stationery, see notebook. ... Microsofts disk operating system, MS-DOS, was Microsofts implementation of DOS, which was the first popular operating system for the IBM PC, and until recently, was widely used on the PC compatible platform. ...

Canonical origins

NFO files were first introduced by "Fabulous Furlough" of the PC organization The Humble Guys, or THG.^[2] Such organizations were also known as "warez groups" or "crack groups". The first use came in 1989 on the THG release of the PC game "Bubble Bobble". This file was used in lieu of the more common "README.TXT" or "README.1ST" file names. The perpetuation of this file extension legacy was carried on by "warez groups" which followed after THG and is still in use to this day, hence its strong presence on Usenet newsgroups which carry binaries and on P2P file trading networks. IBM PC (IBM 5150) with keyboard and green screen monochrome monitor (IBM 5151), running MS-DOS 5. ... This article cites very few or no references or sources. ... Warez refers primarily to copyrighted works traded in violation of copyright law. ... Software cracking is the modification of software to remove protection methods: copy prevention, trial/demo version, serial number, hardware key, CD check or software annoyances like nag screens and adware. ... Bubble Bobble is an arcade game by Taito, first released in 1986. ... A readme (or read me) file contains information about other files in a directory and is very commonly distributed with computer software. ... Usenet (USEr NETwork) is a global, decentralized, distributed Internet discussion system that evolved from a general purpose UUCP architecture of the same name. ... File sharing is the practice of making files available for other users to download over the Internet and smaller networks. ...

The Humble Guys later became a demogroup, thus bringing the .nfo file tradition into the demoscene. Demogroups are teams of demosceners, who make computer-based audio-visual works of art known as demos. ... The demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes itself on producing demos, non-interactive audio-visual presentations, which are run real-time on a computer. ...

Contents

Content of NFO files

Compatibility problems

Canonical origins

See also

References

External links

NFO tools

Platform independent

Windows-only

Contents

Content of NFO files GA_googleFillSlot("encyclopedia_square");

Compatibility problems

Canonical origins

See also

References

External links

NFO tools

Platform independent

Windows-only

Content of NFO files