There are two main reasons to transfer files between a Macintosh and another computer. One is so that they can be used by programs on the other computer. The most common example of this is the World Wide Web, a global collection of files that can be accessed from anywhere on the Internet with just about any kind of computer. The most common kind of files shared this way are text files (see the Glossary topic for the definition of a text file; HTML files are text files).

You may also want to transfer files to another computer for eBay picture hosting, submitting documents to a printing company or service bureau, or submitting advertisements to newspapers and magazines.

Other commonly transferred cross-platform file kinds include image files in formats such as GIF, PNG, Photoshop, EPS, Illustrator and JPEG; movie files in QuickTime and MPEG format; audio files in WAVE, MP3 or AIFF format; files created by productivity applications, such as Microsoft Office; Java applets; and compressed archives in Gzip format. These files can be transferred to a Macintosh using Binary mode and to other computers in the Binary (Raw Data) format. Typically you use Fetch to transfer a file to a server, from which it can be accessed by other users.

The other reason is to use the other computer as a storage place for Macintosh files. This sort of use is also known as "archiving." In this case, it's not important for the file to be in a format understood by the other computer, since it will only be transferred back to a Macintosh. It is important to be able to retrieve the file exactly as it was saved. Fetch supports several file formats that are suitable for archiving Macintosh files: MacBinary, AppleSingle, BinHex, and StuffIt X Archive. A file stored in any of these formats can be reconstructed without any loss of information (for instance, the file kind, icon, and original name will be preserved).

Archiving can be used to distribute software over a large area. There are several large archives of Macintosh programs on the Internet, which can be downloaded by anyone with Internet access. The files are typically stored in MacBinary or BinHex format. One such archive is the Info-Mac archive.

For more about file formats, see the upload formats and download modes help topics.

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