California Office of Statewide Health Planning & Development

Help Tools - Data Formats

File Formats On This Site

File Formats and Plug-Ins

Below is a list of file types that are used on the Web site. A NOTE on viewing and downloading files: Depending on the configuration of your computer, files of the types listed below may:

• open inside of your web browser,
• open in a new program window, or
• ask you where to save the file.

If you would like to download a copy of the file to your computer, right-click (in Windows) or command-click (in Macintosh) and choose "Save Target As..." (IE) or "Save Link As..." (Netscape). This will allow you to save a copy of the file to your computer rather than having the file open inside your web browser.

Proprietary Formats

Proprietary formats require a specific vendor's package to view the files (i.e. Adobe Acrobat, MS Excel).

Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format (pdf) Versions: 6.0/5.0/4.0

Adobe Acrobat / PDF files are used to retain the formatting of printed documents. To view PDF files, you will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

• Plug-In Download
• More Information
• Support

NOTE: Adobe helps make electronic information more accessible to people with disabilities including but not limited to: blindness, low vision, hearing, or motor impairments. For more information, visit the Adobe Accessibility page.

Open Formats

Open formats can be viewed by a number of free or commercial packages.

• ZIP / Self-Extracting ZIP

  ZIP files are used to simplify the download process by wrapping a number of separate files into a single "wrapper" and compressing the original files by a significant amount.
  • WinZip Site
  • Using WinZip

• EXE (Executable Files)

  Exe files are self-extracting data files. (This format is not available to MAC users).
  • WinZip Site
  • WinZip & exe files

• CSV (Comma Separated Values)

  A data format in which each piece of data is separated by a comma. This is a popular format for transferring data from one application to another, because most database and spreadsheet systems are able to import and export comma-delimited data. CSV files can be opened by the majority of spreadsheet and database programs available. This is the primary format used on this site.

• TXT formats

  Are used for comma-delimited data files when text formatting needs to be retained for codes with leading or trailing zeros. This is the secondary format used on this site.

• RTF (Rich Text Format)

  Version: N/A - A standard formalized by Microsoft for specifying formatting of documents. RTF files are actually ASCII (plain text) files with special commands to indicate formatting information, such as fonts and margins. RTF files can be opened by the majority of word processing programs available.