Package file-4.24-1

Identifies a file's type based on the contents then provides a description or a mime type. File tests each argument in an attempt to classify it. There are three sets of tests, performed in this order: filesystem tests, magic number tests, and language tests. The first test that succeeds causes the file type to be printed.

The '-i' option causes the file command to output mime type strings rather than the more traditional human readable ones. Thus it may say "text/plain; charset=us-ascii" rather than "ascii text".