srec_msbin(5)							File Formats Manual						     srec_msbin(5)

NAME

       srec_msbin - Windows CE Binary Image Data Format

DESCRIPTION

       This  format  is  the  output of the Microsoft WinCE Platform Builder.  This is a binary (non-text) file format.  File names in this format
       typically (ambiguously) use the .bin suffix.

   File Format
       Files in this format start with a header record.

       Then comes the data itself, organized into records.

       The file finishes with an execution start address record.  This is mandatory.

   File Header Record
       Data in this format start with an optional header containing the magic "B000FF
", followed by the image start (four bytes, little  endian)
       address	and  the  span	of  the image (highest address - lowest address + 1) (four bytes, little endian).  The file header does not have a
       checksum; it is therefore possible that a corrupt file header will go undetected.

       +-----------+------------+------------+
       |Magic	   | Least	| Greatest   |
       |"B000FF
" | Address	| Address    |
       |(7 bytes)  | (4 bytes)	| (4 bytes)  |
       There-is-no-provision-for+a-file-comment of any kind.

   Data Record
       Each record consists of a record start address (four bytes, little endian), a record length (four bytes, little endian), a record  checksum
       (four bytes, little endian), followed by the record data.  The data part of each record is raw byte values, no encoding.

       +----------+-----------+-----------+-----------+
       |Start	  | Length    | Checksum  |   Data    |
       |address   | (4 bytes) | (4 bytes) |	      |
       |(4 bytes) |	      | 	  |	      |
       +----------+-----------+-----------+-----------+
       The checksum is calculated by a simple sum of unsigned bytes into a 32-bit accumulator.

       The  12	record	header bytes are not included in the record checksums; it is therefore possible that a corrupt record header will go unde-
       tected.

       It is not possible to place data at address zero with this format.  Address zero is reserved for use by the execution start address record.

       There is effectively no limit on the length of a record (2^32-1).  It is not uncommon for a MsBin file to contain records with sizes in the
       tens of megabytes.

   Execution Start Address Record
       Last  comes  a special record with the record address set to zero and record length set to the image execution start address.  According to
       specification the record describing the execution start address must be always present, and must always be the last record in the file.

       +----------+-----------+-----------+
       |Zero	  | Start     | Checksum  |
       |(4 bytes) | Address   | = 0	  |
       |	  | (4 bytes) | (4 bytes) |
       +----------+-----------+-----------+
   Commentary
       The MsBin files produced by SRecord are valid and can be successfully parsed by the command line utilities viewbin  and	cvrtbin  (part	of
       Windows CE platform).

       For  a  MsBin  file  to be usable in Microsoft WinCE Platform Builder it has to contain a TOC meta-structure.  This is data embedded in the
       file by Microsoft WinCE Platform Builder itself.

       The opposite conversion - from MsBin - comes in handy when analyzing a MsBin file (i.e. a WinCE image).

   Size Multiplier
       In general, binary data will expand in sized by approximately 1.0 times (approaching asymptotically from above) when represented with  this
       format, as the 15-byte file header is averaged over the data content.  Holes in the data will also increase the size.

SOURCE

       http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms924510.aspx

COPYRIGHT

       srec_cat version 1.58
       Copyright (C) 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 Peter Miller

       The srec_cat program comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details use the 'srec_cat -VERSion License' command.  This is free software and
       you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; for details use the 'srec_cat -VERSion License' command.

AUTHOR

       Peter Miller   E-Mail:	pmiller@opensource.org.au
       //*		 WWW:	http://miller.emu.id.au/pmiller/

Reference Manual						      SRecord							     srec_msbin(5)