My sense would say tens of thousands of data format standards or semi-standards (defacto standards used by an industry group) exist.
Consider: Every commercial area of business has a large set of data standards, some new, some old/legacy but still in broad use, many versions of each. Similarly, every area of scientific inquiry. Every sector of government similarly. Every sector of military similarly. I just can't see how the multiplier effects don't result in tens of thousands of data standards. I wonder if anyone has ever tried to enumerate all of them in a list somewhere. ________________________________ From: Costello, Roger L. <[email protected]> Sent: Monday, January 28, 2019 2:27:10 PM To: [email protected] Subject: How many data formats are there in the world? Hello DFDL community, Just curious, do you have a guess on the number of data formats there are in existence? I mean digital data formats, and standards-approved (not one-offs). Any guess? Are we talking about a few hundred? A few thousand? More? /Roger
