Talk:Media Types
Introduction
Use the word *recommended*?
Media formats (also known as media types or MIME types) that are "supported" by iDigBio have the potential to be represented in a "pretty" manner in the iDigBio portal. For example, a supported image format will be displayed as a thumbnail of the image itself. iDigBio supports a subset of all available media formats. An "unsupported" media format may only show a placeholder thumbnail that will display the media MIME type (if available).
Alex recommends not using the "unsupported" at all.
Media formats that are supported by iDigBio may have additional display features such as thumbnails, wave forms, viewers or players, etc. available in the iDigBio portal and APIs.
There are many valid media types that are "unsupported" by iDigBio. We encourage data providers to continue sharing those media since sharing increases discoverability and accessibility to the community over not sharing.
One of the primary driving factors between "supported" and "unsupported" in the iDigBio file sizes too large to be usable by a wide community, or need special software not commonly installed on computers, etc.
Legend
- Description
- Brief description of the media type.
- iDigBio short name
- A single word that is a shortened name used by iDigBio internally (for example, the "bucket" name), in documentation about a media type, or possibly seen in API parameters. Examples include "images" and "sounds".
- Supported formats
- A list of known supported file formats in the format that is generally used to describe the format. Examples: JPEG, JPEG 2000, MP4 (AAC audio)
- Common file extensions
- The most commonly used file extensions (letters after the last period in a filename) for files of the particular type. For example, .jpg, .jp2, .mp4, .stl
- Common MIME types
- The common MIME types known to be assigned to this media type, derived from the IANA controlling vocabulary of media types: http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml which is used to populate the dc:format.
- Known Unsupported formats
- A list of known unsupported file formats in the form that is generally used to describe the format. Examples: DNG, RAW, PSD, TIFF, GIF
- Audubon Core Sample Values
- An example of a single media type as it could be represented in Audubon Core.
"dc:type" : "StillImage" "dc:format" : "image/jpeg"
- iDigBio derivatives
- List of derivatives that iDigBio creates for the media type. Examples include "thumbnail", "webview", "fullsize".
Media Types
Sounds
- Description
- Recorded audio or signals such as bird calls, whale song, or electric fish pulses.
- iDigBio short name
- "sounds"
- Supported formats
- MP3 (MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 audio), MP4 (AAC audio)
- Common file extensions
- .mp3, .mp4
- Common MIME types
- audio/mpeg, audio/MPA, audio/mp4
- Known Unsupported formats
- WAV
- Audubon Core Sample Values
"dc:type" : "Sound" "dc:format" : "audio/mpeg"
- iDigBio derivatives
- **** TBD ****
Documents
- Description
- TBD
- iDigBio short name
- "documents"
- Supported formats
- Portable Document Format (PDF)
- Common file extensions
- Common MIME types
- "application/pdf"
- Known Unsupported formats
- DOC, DOCX
- Audubon Core Sample Values
"dc:type" : "Text" "dc:format" : "application/pdf"
- iDigBio derivatives
- **** TBD ****
Images
- Description
- Digital photographs of specimens, labels, sheets
- iDigBio short name
- "images"
- Supported formats
- JPEG, JPEG 2000, PNG
- Common file extensions
- .jpg, .jpeg, .jp2, .png
- Common MIME types
- image/jpeg, image/jp2, image/png
- Known Unsupported formats
- DNG, RAW, PSD, TIFF, GIF
- Audubon Core Sample Values
"dc:type" : "StillImage" "dc:format" : "image/jpeg"
- iDigBio derivatives
- thumbnail, webview, fullsize
Models
- Description
- 3D models and meshes representing specimens as polyhedral objects
- iDigBio short name
- "models"
- Supported formats
- StereoLithograph (STL, binary), Polygon File Format (PLY, binary)
- Common file extensions
- STL, PLY
- Common MIME types
- model/mesh
- Known Unsupported formats
- **** TBD ****
- Audubon Core Sample Values
"dc:type" : "InteractiveResource" "dc:format" : "model/mesh"
- iDigBio derivatives
- **** TBD ****
Video
- Description
- Multiple frame capture of moving visual images with possible audio tracks included.
- iDigBio short name
- "videos"
- Supported formats
- MP4 (H.264 encoding), MPEG
- Common file extensions
- .mp4, .mpeg
- Common MIME types
- video/mp4, video/mpeg
- Known Unsupported formats
- GIF, DIVX, Adobe Flash (F4V, FLV), Quicktime
- Audubon Core Sample Values
"dc:type" : "MovingImage" "dc:format" : "video/mp4"
- iDigBio derivatives
- **** TBD ****