MIME::Types(3pm) User Contributed Perl Documentation MIME::Types(3pm)
NAME
MIME::Types - Definition of MIME types
INHERITANCE
MIME::Types
is an Exporter
SYNOPSIS
use MIME::Types;
my $mt = MIME::Types->new(...); # MIME::Types object
my $type = $mt->type('text/plain'); # MIME::Type object
my $type = $mt->mimeTypeOf('gif');
my $type = $mt->mimeTypeOf('picture.jpg');
my @types = $mt->httpAccept('text/html, application/json;q=0.1')
DESCRIPTION
"MIME Type" is the old name for "Media Type". This module dates from
1999, and name changes are painful, so we stuck with the original name.
Media types are used in many applications (for instance as part of
e-mail and HTTP traffic) to indicate the type of content which is
transmitted. or expected. Read RFC6838 at
https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6838 (registrations) and RFC9694 at
https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc9694 (top-levels) for the
specification.
Sometimes detailed knowledge about a mime-type is need, however this
module only knows about the file-name extensions which relate to some
filetype. It can also be used to produce the right format: types which
are not registered at IANA need to use 'x-' prefixes.
This object administers a huge list of known mime-types, combined from
various sources. For instance, it contains all IANA types and the
knowledge of Apache. Probably the most complete table on the net!
MIME::Types and daemons (fork)
If your program uses fork (usually for a daemon), then you want to have
the type table initialized before you start forking. So, first call
my $mt = MIME::Types->new;
Later, each time you create this object (you may, of course, also reuse
the object you create here) you will get access to the same global table
of types.
METHODS
Constructors
MIME::Types->new(%options)
Create a new "MIME::Types" object which manages the data. In the
current implementation, it does not matter whether you create this
object often within your program, but in the future this may change.
-Option --Default
db_file <installed source>
only_complete <false>
only_iana <false>
skip_extensions <false>
db_file => FILENAME
The location of the database which contains the type information.
Only the first instantiation of this object will have this
parameter obeyed.
[2.10] This parameter can be globally overruled via the
"PERL_MIME_TYPE_DB" environment variable, which may be needed in
case of PAR or other tricky installations. For PAR, you probably
set this environment variable to "inc/lib/MIME/types.db"
only_complete => BOOLEAN
Only include complete MIME type definitions: requires at least one
known extension. This will reduce the number of entries --and
with that the amount of memory consumed-- considerably.
In your program you have to decide: the first time that you call
the creator ("new") determines whether you get the full or the
partial information.
only_iana => BOOLEAN
Only load the types which are currently known by IANA.
skip_extensions => BOOLEAN
Do not load the table to map extensions to types, which is quite
large.
Knowledge
$obj->addType($type, ...)
Add one or more TYPEs to the set of known types. Each TYPE is a
"MIME::Type" which must be experimental: either the main-type or the
sub-type must start with "x-".
Please inform the maintainer of this module when registered types
are missing. Before version MIME::Types version 1.14, a warning was
produced when an unknown IANA type was added. This has been
removed, because some people need that to get their application to
work locally... broken applications...
$obj->extensions()
Returns a list of all defined extensions.
$obj->listTypes()
Returns a list of all defined mime-types by name only. This will
not instantiate MIME::Type objects. See types()
$obj->mimeTypeOf($filename)
Returns the "MIME::Type" object which belongs to the FILENAME (or
simply its filename extension) or "undef" if the file type is
unknown. The extension is used and considered case-insensitive.
In some cases, more than one type is known for a certain filename
extension. In that case, the preferred one is taken (for an unclear
definition of preference)
example: use of mimeTypeOf()
my $types = MIME::Types->new;
my $mime = $types->mimeTypeOf('gif');
my $mime = $types->mimeTypeOf('picture.jpg');
print $mime->isBinary;
$obj->type($string)
Returns the "MIME::Type" which describes the type related to STRING.
[2.00] Only one type will be returned.
[before 2.00] One type may be described more than once. Different
extensions may be in use for this type, and different operating
systems may cause more than one "MIME::Type" object to be defined.
In scalar context, only the first is returned.
$obj->types()
Returns a list of all defined mime-types. For reasons of backwards
compatibility, this will instantiate MIME::Type objects, which will
be returned. See listTypes().
HTTP support
$obj->httpAccept($header)
[2.07] Decompose a typical HTTP-Accept header, and sort it based on
the included priority information. Returned is a sorted list of
type names, where the highest priority type is first. The list may
contain '*/*' (accept any) or a '*' as subtype.
Ill-formated typenames are ignored. On equal qualities, the order
is kept. See RFC2616 section 14.1
example:
my @types = $types->httpAccept('text/html, application/json;q=0.9');
$obj->httpAcceptBest($accept|\@types, @have)
[2.07] The $accept string is processed via httpAccept() to order the
types on preference. You may also provide a list of ordered @types
which may have been the result of that method, called earlier.
As second parameter, you pass a LIST of types you @have to offer.
Those need to be MIME::Type objects. The preferred type will get
selected. When none of these are accepted by the client, this will
return "undef". It should result in a 406 server response.
example:
my $accept = $req->header('Accept');
my @have = map $mt->type($_), qw[text/plain text/html];
my @ext = $mt->httpAcceptBest($accept, @have);
$obj->httpAcceptSelect($accept|\@types, @filenames|\@filenames)
[2.07] Like httpAcceptBest(), but now we do not return a pair with
mime-type and filename, not just the type. If $accept is "undef",
the first filename is returned.
example:
use HTTP::Status ':constants';
use File::Glob 'bsd_glob'; # understands blanks in filename
my @filenames = bsd_glob "$imagedir/$fnbase.*;
my $accept = $req->header('Accept');
my ($fn, $mime) = $mt->httpAcceptSelect($accept, @filenames);
my $code = defined $mime ? HTTP_NOT_ACCEPTABLE : HTTP_OK;
FUNCTIONS
The next functions are provided for backward compatibility with
MIME::Types versions [0.06] and below. This code originates from Jeff
Okamoto okamoto@corp.hp.com and others.
by_mediatype(TYPE)
This function takes a media type and returns a list or anonymous
array of anonymous three-element arrays whose values are the file
name suffix used to identify it, the media type, and a content
encoding.
TYPE can be a full type name (contains '/', and will be matched in
full), a partial type (which is used as regular expression) or a
real regular expression.
by_suffix(FILENAME|SUFFIX)
Like "mimeTypeOf", but does not return an "MIME::Type" object. If
the file +type is unknown, both the returned media type and encoding
are empty strings.
example: use of function by_suffix()
use MIME::Types 'by_suffix';
my ($mediatype, $encoding) = by_suffix('image.gif');
my $refdata = by_suffix('image.gif');
my ($mediatype, $encoding) = @$refdata;
import_mime_types()
This method has been removed: mime-types are only useful if
understood by many parties. Therefore, the IANA assigns names which
can be used. In the table kept by this "MIME::Types" module all
these names, plus the most often used temporary names are kept.
When names seem to be missing, please contact the maintainer for
inclusion.
SEE ALSO
This module is part of MIME-Types distribution version 2.28, built on
April 18, 2025. Website: http://perl.overmeer.net/CPAN/
LICENSE
Copyrights 1999-2025 by [Mark Overmeer <mark@overmeer.net>]. For other
contributors see ChangeLog.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself. See http://dev.perl.org/licenses/
perl v5.40.1 2025-04-21 MIME::Types(3pm)
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