Data Format Description Language (DFDL)

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The DFDL WG is now at http://redmine.ogf.org/projects/dfdl-wg

Data Format Description Language (DFDL) is a language for describing text and binary data formats. A DFDL description allows any text or binary data to be read from its native format and to be presented as an instance of an information set. DFDL also allows data to be taken from an instance of an information set and written out to its native format. DFDL achieves this by leveraging W3C XML Schema Definition Language (XSDL) 1.0. It is therefore very easy to use DFDL to convert text and binary data to a corresponding XML document.

An XML schema is written for the logical model of the data. The schema is augmented with special DFDL annotations. These annotations are used to describe the native (non-XML) format of the data.

This is an established approach that is already being used today in commercial systems. DFDL evolves this approach into an open standard capable of describing almost any format of text or binary data.

The home page for the DFDL standard itself is here http://www.ogf.org/dfdl/