2004.05.27 01:15 "[Tiff] large TIFF - two alternatives", by Steve Carlsen

2004.06.01 11:50 "Re: [Tiff] large TIFF - two alternatives", by John Aldridge

This is a serious question, and not intended as a flame: if I need to support a new file format to get >2/4GB support, why wouldn't I just use PNG?

...and got several informative answers which basically fall in to two camps:

(a) So PNG can handle images > 4GB. That's precious little use without the ability to do random access to parts of the image.

Having thought about it a bit, I agree entirely.

(b) Tiff can handle <data-format-of-choice-for-my-application>.

This is both a strength /and/ a weakness. The fact that Tiff has so many different ways of storing data is handy for the writer, but a real pain for the reader. Maybe PNG isn't flexible enough, but Tiff is so flexible that supporting the full spec is a lot of work.

Thanks,

John