arArchivDatei

arArchivDatei is a term used in German-language software documentation to denote an abstraction or representation of an archive file. It is not a universal standard name, but a conventional identifier used in several codebases to encapsulate the structure and metadata of an archive.

Typically, an arArchivDatei includes metadata such as name, path, size, creation date, and modification date, together with a list of entries. Each entry carries its own metadata (file name, size, timestamp) and a reference to its data. The archive may also store information about the format and compression method, along with a checksum or hash to verify integrity. The actual binary data may be stored directly in the object or referenced via a data stream.

Functions commonly associated with arArchivDatei include opening or loading the archive, enumerating entries, extracting one or more entries, adding or removing entries, and rebuilding the archive. Access can be performed in a streaming fashion or via a random-access index, enabling selective extraction without reading the entire payload.

Relation to formats: It is typically an abstraction over established archive formats such as ZIP, TAR, or 7z, or over project-specific archive formats. In libraries that aim to provide a unified interface, arArchivDatei serves as a generic container type while the concrete format handler performs the encoding and decoding. It should not be confused with the Unix ar tool, which creates static libraries (.a).

Origin of the name: The prefix ar- is a common convention to signal archiving, and ArchivDatei is a straightforward German compound noun; accordingly, programmers may adopt arArchivDatei as a class or module name to indicate its role as an archive container.

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