DROID - User guide

DROID (Digital Record Object IDentification) is a file format identification tool developed by The National Archives. It is in widespread use across the world, in cultural memory institutions, local and central government departments and other public bodies, and has been embedded into multiple commercial and open source digital preservation products.

The core function of DROID is accurate file format identification, even if the file extension is wrong or missing. Where possible, identifications are made beyond the broad type, down to the version level e.g. Acrobat PDF v.1.6 - Portable Document Format. DROID can currently identify over 1400 file formats, and this number is growing all the time. Information about file formats including the identification signatures utilised by DROID are kept within PRONOM, The National Archives’ file format registry.

In addition to identifying the file format DROID also extracts other information about the files it scans, such as, file size, last modified date and file path. This information is presented in a profile which can be analysed on screen in the DROID Graphical User Interface (GUI) using filtering, or exported to a CSV file. DROID also examines the files within container files, such as ‘zip’ files, as well as the container file itself.