Use application vendor's API or libraries to read the file. Vendors often provide .Net library for reading the file from disk or via API call. This would be the clean and supported way. For example, to read dBase database files, there's a library at Github. Read the file as raw binary (as explained in the article linked by Abraham Zinala).Right-click on the .dat file. Select Open with. Then, select the program …May 15, 2021 · First, download the .dat file attachment. Select the file and click on “Open.”. After the file is uploaded, click on “Start” and allow the file to be analyzed. The result page will show everything available in the DAT file. Just click on the item, and it will be downloaded to your computer, and you can open it to view. Step 1: Locate the DAT file on your computer. Find the .DAT file you want …First, copy the wallet.dat file to another location to attempt to open that (you don't want to destroy the only file copy you have). Now you can download "pywallet" from Github and use that to print the private keys inside the wallet file. This only works if the wallet is not encrypted, or it's encrypted and you have the password.The fastest way to open the folder where your Outlook Data Files (.pst and .ost) are saved is to do the following: In Outlook, select the File tab, then on the Info tab, select Account Settings > Account Settings. Select the Data Files tab, select an entry in the table, and then click Open Folder Location.Apr 13, 2024 · Hence, make sure that the VLC Media Player app is installed on your computer. With that being said, you can follow the steps right below to open a video DAT file using a video player on your Windows 11 PC or laptop: 1. Locate the DAT file on your Windows device. 2. Double-click it to open the Open with dialog box. 3. Right-click the DAT file. Right-clicking a file will display a pop-up menu for that file. If you are using an Apple Magic Mouse or a Macbook with a trackpad, you can right-click by clicking with two fingers on the trackpad or magic mouse. 2. Hover the over Open With…. This will display a list of applications that the file can be opened up ...Select the file and click on Open. The DAT file will open in Notepad and the data in the file will appear as shown. Select the entire data by pressing ‘Ctrl + A’ on your keyboard. After the data has been selected, press ‘Ctrl + C’ on your keyboard to copy the data. Open a new Excel worksheet.Step 2: Make a copy of the DAT file. Right-click the file, select “Copy,” then right-click on your desktop or another folder and select “Paste.”. Always make a copy of the original file before trying to open it in different software. This way, you won’t mess up the original data if something goes wrong.Feb 6, 2012 · The first thing to understand about .DAT files is that it indicates a file that has arbitrary data. That means it... How to read and open .DAT files in Windows. 43. 134K views 12 years ago. How to read and open .DAT files in …Use the Winmail.dat Reader to view, copy and paste the content into a word processor for conversion. You can also use an online conversion service to prevent installing a program o...When you have a large file or group of large files that you want to send to someone, but you don't want to clog up your Dropbox account and you don't have time to just drive over t...2. Open DAT Files with a Specific Program. Once you identify the program associated with the DAT file, right-click the file and choose Open With. Select the appropriate application from the list of available programs, or click the Browse button to locate it manually. For example, if you’re trying to open a video file that has a DAT …In this Video We are going to see How To Open DAT File In Windows PC or Laptop by the Simplest Way.There are two main types of .dat files: text and binary. Text .dat files can be opened and edited with a text editor, making them ideal for storing human-readable data. On the other hand, binary .dat files store data in a format that is not human-readable, but they can hold more complex data structures and can be more space-efficient. What data a .DAT file includes and the format it takes, can be almost endless in possibility. DAT files can contain anything from video to audio to PDF information. As such, you’re likely to see DAT files produced by programmes of all shapes and sizes. Whether it’s on your desktop or your mobile, a video game or an email attachment, DAT ... Open it in Text Editor and look at the header and footer. Type it into Google if it is readable. Try using File Juicer. Binwalk can be also be used to scan for signatures of known file types. But if it's a proprietary format you're probably better of doing static analysis on the program parsing the files.Windows. Have your wallet.dat handy. For Bitcoin, run walletool.exe -d wallet.dat -v bitcoin. For Litecoin, run walletool.exe -d wallet.dat -v litecoin. A list of addresses / private keys is printed.If you try to open winmail.dat, you will probably be prompted to specify the application that should be used to open the file. Because this file is in a Microsoft proprietary Outlook/Exchange format, you may not have an application installed that can decode this file and display it.Dat Bike is on a mission to put more electric bikes on Vietnam’s roads. The startup said today it has raised $8 million led by returning investor Singapore-based firm Jungle Ventur...Jul 14, 2015 · In Windows XP and below, go to View Tab > Folder options > View > Hide extensions for known file types (untick this box) Show or hide file extensions in Windows. After taking these steps, all file names will be shown along with their extensions. Now you can confirm if you really have a .dat file with you. NTUSER.DAT can be strictly defined as a primary registry hive file, integrated into the operating system. Therefore, NTUSER.DAT stores particular user-level registry data. NTUSER.DAT file entity is typically allocated within the C:/Users/ [user]/ folder. As long as NTUSER.DAT serves for storing vital and crucial user settings and tweaks, it is ...A .DAT file is a generic data file that may store any information, such as audio, video, PDFs, or images. Learn how to open a .DAT file with text editors, media players, or image viewers depending on its format and source. Find troubleshooting tips and common programs for opening .DAT files.read.delim(events.dat) To answer your f/u question the sep="\t" means that the separator is a tab. R likes that command better than inseting an actual tab into quotes. ShareStep 2: Open the app and drag your winmail.dat attachment onto it. Alternatively, you can right-click on the attachment and choose “Open with” > TNEF’s Enough, or choose “File” > “Open” in the app. Step 3: The application will show you the contents of the DAT file. Step 4: You can then export them in the right format.A DAT file is a data file that contains specific information about the program used to create it. You can open it with relevant apps such as media players, text editors, or photo apps depending on the type of information it contains. Learn how to open a DAT file with or without knowing its content, and when to convert it.That archive.dat is basically just a text file, you can open it with wordpad but it may just be a bunch of non readable garble.But that specific file is just an index file used for the backup data so its not got any actual game data (like a chapter page of a book). So im afraid if your data is gone from the console and your backups corrupted ...I understand that you're unable to open Winmail.dat file attachments not opening in Outlook for Office 365. I can imagine how inconvenient this must be on your end. Don't worry, let me assist you. To narrow down the root cause of this issue, I would like to gather more information. Kindly answer the following questions:Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Bitcoin using Windows Explorer. In that folder, hold shift and right-click and select Open command window here . In the command prompt, type bitcoin-qt.exe -rescan and hit enter . Now Bitcoin-Qt should start and rescan the blockchain to calculate the balances of the addresses in your wallet.dat file.Link. ".dat" is an extension used for many different data file formats, some of them text based and some of them binary and some of them a mix of text and binary. For binary files, you can fopen () the file with 'a+' permission, and fseek () to the appropriate location, and fwrite () a new binary value and then fclose ().You can use various web services and mobile apps to view a winmail.dat file's contents. Keep in mind that the contents of a winmail.dat file are always identical to the email's body, so if you can read the email, you don't need to open the winmail.dat file.In this Video We are going to see How To Open DAT File In Windows PC or Laptop by the Simplest Way.DAT files are generic data files that store information for various programs. Learn how to open them with text editors or …Jul 3, 2021 ... There are many ways of opening a DAT files. You can load them to Excel, Concordance or preview in Relativity Desktop Client.May 25, 2017 ... Techromancer ... .dat is one of the most generic extensions going (probably second only to .bin), and any dev could have made up whatever format ...J.Crew, Neiman Marcus, JCPenney, Pier 1 Imports: These are just a few of the retailers that have filed for bankruptcy during the coronavirus pandemic. J.Crew, Neiman Marcus, JCPenn...Since it is worth probably at least $100 now I decided to check the exact amount. I downloaded the latest version of bitcoin core, added the wallet.dat file to the data directory, started it with -rescan, and waited almost a month (!) for the blockchain data to get up to date. The balance showed as 0 the whole time.First, open your Windows Notepad application. And then select File and then Open. In the Files tab, select All Files and then you have to open the DAT file. If the file contains only text, then be assured that it is the text type. And if you see another file type like “GIF”, “PNG” or “JFIF, then it is an image file.Right-click on the DAT file you want to open and select Open with from the drop-down menu, then choose the text editor. If the DAT file is a video, you can open it with its associated video app ...4. Firstly, the dat file can be anything. Use file <yourfile>.dat to find what it is. Then depending out its type, use specific application to open it. mplayer <yourfile>.dat. gedit <yourfile>.dat. Share. Improve this answer. answered Jul 4, 2012 at 9:16.Right-click on the DAT file you want to open and select Open with from the drop-down menu, then choose the text editor. If the DAT file is a video, you can open it with its associated video app ...STEP 1: Download the system.new.dat.br Extractor Tool. First and foremost, download the extractor tool: Extract_system_new_dat_br_Tool.rar. Once downloaded, extract to any convenient location on your PC. You should get the following files: Android-Tool and System Repack Finish folders, Auto Tool, Brotli, and Instructions txt (with link …Open in MATLAB Online. No it isn't. >> !unzip -t WRAS-C.zip. Archive: WRAS-C.zip. testing: WRAS-C.txt OK. No errors detected in compressed data of WRAS-C.zip. You have a .txt file not a .dat file. But if what youreally had is WRAS-C.dat then. filename = 'WRAS-C.dat';Opening .dat files in Excel on Mac may seem tricky at first, but with the help of the text import wizard, it can be a seamless process. Here's a step-by-step guide to using the text import wizard: Step 1: Open Excel on your Mac and go to the "Data" tab on the top menu. Step 2:Learn how to open a DAT file by determining what kind of information it contains and using the relevant app. Find out when you don't need to open a DAT file and when you can convert it.Mar 2, 2021 · To create a DAT file in Porteus: Boot Porteus into the KDE, Xfce, or LXDE desktop interfaces. After the boot is complete, open the Porteus menu and select System → Porteus save.dat manager. Click Create. Follow the prompts to finish creating your DAT file. If you're using a Linux system or a system with similar tools you could also try just running the file command on it and seeing if it gives any useful output, but for the moment I'm assuming you're using Windows. 2. Okay, this is the incredibly specific circumstance I find myself in. I have a .DAT file that was originally a ZIP folder ...Aug 16, 2017 · A .data file, sometimes also called a .dat file, is a file containing pertinent information about a program or another file. You don't need a special program... Hence, .dat files follow no specific protocols which affect all .dat files, unlike .gif or .docx files. If you want to understand how .dat files work and convert to human-readable form, you need to know how the application handles these files beforehand. For the Chinese characters, you tried to decode the binary .dat file by the UTF-16 format ...Here are the steps to convert dat to zip archive using ezyZip. To select dat file (s), you have two options: Click "Select DAT files to convert" to open the file chooser. Drag and drop dat file (s) directly onto ezyZip. (Optional) Set the desired compression level by clicking the down arrow next to "Convert to ZIP".There are two main types of .dat files: text and binary. Text .dat files can be opened and edited with a text editor, making them ideal for storing human-readable data. On the other hand, binary .dat files store data in a format that is not human-readable, but they can hold more complex data structures and can be more space-efficient.Step 1- Launch a web browser on your PC and enter the link to the website mentioned above. Step 2- Click on the ‘ Choose file ‘ option and then, use the dialog box which appears on your screen to navigate to the location where your DAT file is stored. Step 3- Select your .DAT file and click on ‘ Open ‘ to upload it on this website.1. Double-click on the IDX file. The file will automatically open in Notepad on Windows, or in TextEdit on Mac OS X. If the IDX file fails to open, proceed to the next step. 2. Right-click on the IDX file, and select “Open With.”. If using Mac OS X, select “Get Info,” then click on “Open With.”. 3.I would suggest you to follow these steps and check if it helps: a. Right click on the file. b. Select Open with. c. Select Notepad, if it is a text file. If the file does not open, you need to repeat the steps for different applications and check if it works. Rohit S.Here are three examples of r code to import data from a .dat file. Each of these data files can be found along with others at Stata dataset files. You can substitute any of them for the ones used here. > library (haven) > df = read_dta (“demo.dta”) > df. # A tibble: 180 x 6. year qtr gdp pr m1 rs.Jul 17, 2019 ... One is definitely to right click on the file in Windows Explorer, and click on "Open With". Then, from there, you can specify a different ...Jul 3, 2021 ... There are many ways of opening a DAT files. You can load them to Excel, Concordance or preview in Relativity Desktop Client. View detailed instructions here: https://spreadcheaters.com/how-to-open-a-dat-file-in-excel/ Nov 20, 2023 · Step 2: Navigating the Open Dialog Box. Select ‘Open’ from the sidebar. Now click ‘Browse.’. To ensure visibility, choose ‘All Files’ in the dropdown menu next to ‘File name.’. Locate your .dat file and click ‘Open.’. 2] Convert INDD file to PDF. Converting an INDD file to a PDF is easy …Again, opening a DAT file extension is always contingent on the origin program. However, there are some limitations on an iPhone, and you may need to download an app in order to open the file. TNEF’s Enough is popular for opening Outlook attachments with .dat file extensions, and you may be able to read a .dat text file through the iPhone’s ...Hi!Long time i didn't make a tutorial...Today i want show you how extract files (models) from UNITY 3D "DAT" files..Unity have 2 files formats.. one are the ...Nam Anh Cap. 17.3K subscribers. Subscribed. 156. 84K views 3 years …Mar 14, 2017 ... .dat file extension is a generic file type that could contain just about anything. Unless you know of the application that created the file with ...If you’re in the trucking industry, you know how crucial it is to find the right loads for your business. This is where a DAT load board can be a game-changer. A DAT load board is ...Easiest way to open and read .DAT files in Windows.How To Open .DAT File – Easy Way To Open .DAT Files https://www.wiknix.com/how-to-open-dat-file/Step 1) First, visit the iOS store, After that, install TNEF’s Enough on your iOS device. Step 2) Locate the Winmail.dat file you want to open. Select it to open with TNEF’s Enough. Step 3) Check the output. You will check the file contents displayed in the app.First, open your Windows Notepad application. And then select File and then Open. In the Files tab, select All Files and then you have to open the DAT file. If the file contains only text, then be assured that it is the text type. And if you see another file type like “GIF”, “PNG” or “JFIF, then it is an image file.Step 2: Make a copy of the DAT file. Right-click the file, select “Copy,” then right-click on your desktop or another folder and select “Paste.”. Always make a copy of the original file before trying to open it in different software. This way, you won’t mess up the original data if something goes wrong.Jul 14, 2015 · In Windows XP and below, go to View Tab > Folder options > View > Hide extensions for known file types (untick this box) Show or hide file extensions in Windows. After taking these steps, all file names will be shown along with their extensions. Now you can confirm if you really have a .dat file with you. Select the file and click on Open. The DAT file will open in Notepad and the dat
2. Since you know its binary, I assume you understand HEX. If so, you can "dump" the file with "od -xc filename". If you are familiar with the "vi" editor, then you could use a "binary vi editor", called "bvi". Thank you for the response. However, I am not familiar with anything, so I will appreciate a step-by-step method on how to go about it.Step 1: Launch Excel on your computer. Step 2: Click on the 'File' tab at the top left corner of the Excel window. Step 3: Select 'Open' from the dropdown menu to open the file explorer. Step 4: Navigate to the location where the dat file is stored on your computer. Step 5: In the file explorer, change the file type filter to 'All Files' to ...Winmail.dat Explorer is a free app to open those 'winmail.dat' attachments. This app is free of charge, giving you access to the original attachment files without any need for further in-app purchases. The optional in-app-purchase will remove ads and help fund further development of new features. You can open a file by using the context menu in ...DAT 文件是一个数据文件，其中包含有关用于创建它的程序的特定信息。 此文件具有 .dat 文件扩展名，这是一种通用格式，可以包含任何信息——视频、音频、PDF 以及几乎任何其他类型的文件。 许多桌面和移动应用程序引用 DAT 文件，因此这些文件的扩展名为 .dat。在许多情况下，你可能会遇到这些 ...Apr 11, 2023 · First, download the file from the email and then head to Winmaildat.com. Click on the Choose File button and go to the dat file location. Click on the Open option. Once the file is uploaded, click on the Start button and let the website analyze the file. Now you should be able to see the contents of the dat file. How to Open DAT Files? DAT files can be played by Windows Media Player, VLC Media Player, KMPlayer, RealPlayer, MPlayer, and 5KPlayer. Besides, changing the file extension from .dat to .mpg can make it accepted by more media players. Before you do that, make a copy of the file. Best DAT File ConvertersDouble click the DAT file on Media Browser window, and then the monitor window will be highlighted. Click the play button in monitor window. Step 4. Trim video. If you want to cut the video before importing to timeline, just click the left button for the set-in point and right for the set-out point.I want to explore and analyze the final raster after applying the processing steps in QGIS. But this software does not see '.dat' file extension as a valid input. I have come across tools which convert ASCII to raster. The .dat file I have is close to 530MB. I opened it in wordpad and it was all gibberish.Step 1: Launch Excel on your computer. Step 2: Click on the 'File' tab at the top left corner of the Excel window. Step 3: Select 'Open' from the dropdown menu to open the file explorer. Step 4: Navigate to the location where the dat file is stored on your computer. Step 5: In the file explorer, change the file type filter to 'All Files' to ...Instructions to upload DAT file located on DJI aircraft. After flying, connect your DJI aircraft to your computer via an USB cable and open DJI Assistant 2, then click on the phone/tablet icon. Click on the aircraft icon (in this example it's a Mavic Pro). Click on "Data Upload" in the DJI Assistant 2 App.Also in those collection of dat files i found. Magic.ini - Configuration file. Seems like those files are created with some. [MAGIC_ENV] Owner = Magic Software Enterprises Ltd. Anyone have any solution how to convert those data to SQL / ACCESS / EXCELL. You need to know what format those files are.Open the .dat file just the way you open it in your question in Stata. Save it as a Stata .dta file in the same folder (C:\Users\Owner...) Open the .do file (using Notepad++) that is in your (C:\Users\Owner...) folder. At the very beginning you will see the author presctibes local variables for the paths of .dta, .dat and .dct files.A DAT file is a generic data file created by a specific application. Learn how to open and use DAT files for Minecraft, Piriform, Inno Setup, and other programs.Home. Productivity. How to Open a DAT File or Convert It Into a Word …Use application vendor's API or libraries to read the file. Vendors often provide .Net library for reading the file from disk or via API call. This would be the clean and supported way. For example, to read dBase database files, there's a library at Github. Read the file as raw binary (as explained in the article linked by Abraham Zinala).2. Open DAT Files with a Specific Program. Once you identify the program associated with the DAT file, right-click the file and choose Open With. Select the appropriate application from the list of available programs, or click the Browse button to locate it manually. For example, if you’re trying to open a video file that has a DAT …There are many ways to do this. One is definitely to right click on the file in Windows Explorer, and click on "Open With". Then, from there, you can specify a different program to open .dat files and then click on "Always use selected to open .dat files". A second way would be to go to the .dat file's properties and changing it there, which ...That archive.dat is basically just a text file, you can open it with wordpad but it may just be a bunch of non readable garble.But that specific file is just an index file used for the backup data so its not got any actual game data (like a chapter page of a book). So im afraid if your data is gone from the console and your backups corrupted ...May 15, 2021 · First, download the .dat file attachment. Select the file and click on “Open.”. After the file is uploaded, click on “Start” and allow the file to be analyzed. The result page will show everything available in the DAT file. Just click on the item, and it will be downloaded to your computer, and you can open it to view. The macro works, however it causes the data to be compiled into one column (ex. supposed to be 5 columns, now 1 column with all the numbers as a long text string). Is there a better way to open a very large .dat file, split it up and import it into separate worksheets while keeping the data in separate columns using the tab delimiter?Good day. Once you have downloaded the USB .dat files from the terminal, you may zip the files and just send the file accordingly. For your info, this file can only be read by our software as it is required our SDK to decrypted USB .dat file. DeleteThe original Bitcoin client stores private key information in a file named wallet.dat. This file contains your private keys, public keys, the transactions related to your wallet, and other important data. If you have an HD wallet, it also includes the HD seed and the private key's derivation paths. Keep this file safe, as it contains your bitcoins.In this case, the good news is that antivirus programs can open .DAT files. So, the smartest thing to do when you want to open such a file for the first time is to use a very good antivirus solution. Of course, there are plenty of such programs on the market, but for this, we have put together an excellent and useful guide for you.Right-click on the .dat file. Select Open with. Then, select the program …43. 134K views 12 years ago. How to read and open .DAT files in …Apr 1, 2020 · To open the .dat file in Windows using a text editor, right-click on the file you want to open, and select Open With. Select the text editor you want to use, and click OK. You’ll be able to read the file’s contents if it’s a text-based .dat file. Here's how you can load and process this .dat file in Python: 1. Open and Read the File: First, you need to open the file using the open () function and then read its contents using methods like read (), readline (), or readlines (). In this example, we'll use readlines () to read each line of the file. python.In this video i want show you how extract DAT files (not ASSETS) from Unity Engine GamesAll of the approaches seem to encounter a problem with the length of the line in question which composes the entire dat. file. Any suggestions are appreciated! PS: I am a beginner in R. I think it will be good to add an example so here it comes: If we have a text file containing a single line as follows: 1 a 5 2 b 6 3 c 7After selecting the type of file, click on save option to save file in Excel form; Method 2: Convert .dat files to Excel using the Copy and Paste options Step 1 – Select the File. Click on the .dat file in the Files Explorer to select it; Step 2 – Open the File in Notepad. Click on File and a context menu will appear 2. Open DAT Files with a Specific Program. Once you identify the program associated with the DAT file, right-click the file and choose Open With. Select the appropriate application from the list of available programs, or click the Browse button to locate it manually. For example, if you’re trying to open a video file that has a DAT extension ... It’s quick and simple to use, with no hidden costs, registration or email required. Drop your files here. Drop files here or. browse files. Check out our winmail.dat solution for iPhone, iPad, Mac and Android devices. Extract the content of this pesky Outlook attachments called winmail.dat or ATT0001.dat with this online tool.Mar 10, 2023 · DAT file contains text, videos, config, or pictures related data, so opening the file will depend on the data it contains. If the file can be opened in the application, then opening it by default opening method in Windows will work. However, most files cannot be opened through normal procedures. The most common opening method is to open the DAT ... Filing income taxes can be stressful, but these tax tips will make filing taxes much simpler. Read our list of income tax tips. Advertisement Income taxes are one of our largest ex...In this Video We are going to see How To Open DAT File In Windows PC or Laptop by the Simplest Way.Again, opening a DAT file extension is always contingent on the origin program. However, there are some limitations on an iPhone, and you may need to download an app in order to open the file. TNEF’s Enough is popular for opening Outlook attachments with .dat file extensions, and you may be able to read a .dat text file through the iPhone’s ...Import the DAT file into Microsoft Word, and save the file as a DOC for future use. You can also change the DAT extension to DOC and import it into Word or convert the file online ...The simplest way to open Winmail.dat on your Mac is to save it and relabel the files to the intended files type, such as txt., doc., pdf. etc. Before you do that, make sure your Mac can show the file extensions. Open the email including the Winmail.dat file in Mail on your Mac. Right-click the Winmail.dat file and choose Save Attachment.Learn how to open different types of DAT files using various programs and online tools. Find out how to identify text-based or video-based DAT files and how to convert them if needed.Import the DAT file into Microsoft Word, and save the file as a DOC for future use. You can also change the DAT extension to DOC and import it into Word or convert the file online ...Import the DAT file into Microsoft Word, and save the file as a DOC for future use. You can also change the DAT extension to DOC and import it into Word or convert the file online ...Download it from the Mac App Store, open it, drag the winmail.dat attachment onto it, or right-click the attachment and choose ‘Open with’ and TNEF’s Enough. Once the application has opened it, you can export it in the correct file format. As you can see, there are a number of ways to open winmail.dat files on your Mac.Mar 19, 2023 · 原文: DAT File – How to Open the .dat File Format Extension. DAT ファイルは、そのファイルを作成したプログラムに関わる特別な情報を含むデータファイルです。 このファイルは .dat という拡張子を持ち、あらゆる情報を含めることが可能な汎用的な形式です。(動画 ... How to Open DAT Files? DAT files can be played by Windows Media Player, VLC Media Player, KMPlayer, RealPlayer, MPlayer, and 5KPlayer. Besides, changing the file extension from .dat to .mpg can make it accepted by more media players. Before you do that, make a copy of the file. Best DAT File ConvertersStep 1: Launch this program on your computer and hit the “Next” button to enter the main interface. Step 2: Add Winmail.dat files by clicking “Select Files” or “Select Folders” and then click “Next”. Step 3: Select the output format according to your basic requirements on “Select Saving Option” bar.Right-click on your desktop > New > Text document. 2. Open it then File > Save as. 3. Rename it then save it as .exe (Example: disassociate.exe) 4. Now, right-click on a .dat file > Properties. 5. Click Change > More apps > Look for another app in this PC. Aug 23, 2018 · DAT files are generic data files that store information for various prog