Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?

Gurth

Probably a very long shot, but: I have a few old files in a file format that was apparently in use about 25 years ago, called Farallon Replica. I’ve not been able to find any real information on it at all, other than that its purpose was PDF-like, preserving formatting etc. across platforms.

Anyone here know how to open these files, other than with a hex editor? There was apparently a viewer for Windows, with Mac (Classic) and Unix versions planned, but haven’t yet found a copy of any of them.

ben_lubar

Is it a text-based format like RTF? I can only find three things about it:

Here's an online/offline converter [site under construction, no upload or download available]
"You can open it with notepad"
"You can open it with VLC" (I assume this is a different meaning of RPL)

stillwater

@gurth said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

Probably a very long shot

You don't say!

Gąska

Meta Magazine History

There's an EXE file on this page that claims to be Replica file with embedded reader. Maybe you can find a way to plug in your own files. You'll probably need Windows 3.1 to run it.

Gurth

@ben_lubar said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

Is it a text-based format like RTF?

Unfortunately not. Here’s the start of a file when opened in a text editor:

Farallon Replica (TM)   x00x00x00Hx00Hx00dx00x00‹x00s·x00Ä·x00ç·x003Cx00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00x00⁄ß‚X"s@ö™»å!'>/ˆí¬êX2◊ﬁ‰ç6d0Óçã¬inö˛>Õ∂8Òx00x00s“x00x00 x00Ãx00

I could barely find any readable text in it at all, other than a few titles that appear inside the document. You can’t even use a text editor to get the text out if you don’t need the graphics.

I can only find three things about it:

Here's an online/offline converter [site under construction, no upload or download available]

"You can open it with notepad”

Yes, you can. See above.

"You can open it with VLC" (I assume this is a different meaning of RPL)

I had come across that suggestion too, but it must be about something else that happens to share the name.

@gąska said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

Meta Magazine History

There's an EXE file on this page that claims to be Replica file with embedded reader. Maybe you can find a way to plug in your own files. You'll probably need Windows 3.1 to run it.

A copy of Windows 3.1 is the easy part :) But you have hit gold there: that “embedded viewer” turns out to be a stand-alone viewer that comes with a copy of that magazine. If you run the exe, it first says the viewer isn’t installed on your system, and would you like it to be? Say yes, and it installs a copy of it in which you can just do File -> Open to see any other Replica files you may have.

0_1527429973967_Replica viewer.png

Thanks for finding this!

Gąska

@gurth I'm shocked this actually worked. It was on 3rd page of the 3rd search phrase I tried. The last time I went this far was in ~2010 when searching for Ace Combat 2 OST before it was available on YouTube.

Also, that slogan didn't age well.

Gurth

@gąska said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

Also, that slogan didn't age well.

My thought exactly when I opened the about window for that screenshot. An article I came across said this Farallon company was ahead of Adobe at the time (1993). Maybe they were, but they sure didn’t hold onto that lead.

stillwater

Oh wow a happy ending. Sweet.

Unperverted Vixen

@gurth said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

An article I came across said this Farallon company was ahead of Adobe at the time (1993). Maybe they were, but they sure didn’t hold onto that lead.

I'm not sure they were ever really ahead. Farallon's lone advantage when they entered the market was that the reader was free, back when Adobe charged $50 for Acrobat Reader. Obviously that was an easy enough problem for Adobe to fix.

Gurth

@unperverted-vixen said in Anyone here ever heard of a file format called “Replica”?:

I'm not sure they were ever really ahead. Farallon's lone advantage when they entered the market was that the reader was free

I was referring to that article, yes :) Giving it away for free is a good way to get your software adopted, others have proven. But like you said, Adobe could fix that easily enough, and they probably had more money to throw at it in the long run.