Converting File Formats

Redhat Linux has a number of scripts built in for converting files from one format to another. Most of these scripts are simply front ends for Ghostscript. We list many of these conversion scripts below, with annotations for those most commonly used. The list is not exhaustive. Most of these scripts are in the /usr/bin directory. For other conversions, you may use ghostscript directly, based on one of the many output devices available.

One may convert postscript to almost any other format.

PDF is a popular file format for transferring documents on the Web. It can be converted to many other formats as well.

PNM is a generic file format that ghostscript uses as a sort of hub - a format to which it can convert anything, and from which it can write anything. Note in particular that it can be converted to postscript, so you can convert a lot of formats to postscript by first changing them to pnm.

PNG is a lossless graphics format that is free.

GIF is a more commonly used graphics format, but is under license to Unisys, hence it might cost you to use it. It is inferior to png anyway.

JPEG is a lossy graphics format used most often for photos and other graphics with more gradual changes from pixel to pixel.

TIFF is a lossy graphics format used most often for high-quality printed images.

RTF files may be viewed using e.g. M$ Word.

Texi is a Tex info file

SGML is a printer's markup language.