Acta Cryst. (1991). A47, 655-685

International Union of Crystallography

• Commission on Crystallographic Data
• Commission on Journals
• Working Party on Crystallographic Information

The Crystallographic Information File (CIF): a New Standard Archive File for Crystallography[1]

BY SYDNEY R. HALL, Crystallography Centre, University of Western Australia, Nedlands 6009, Australia

FRANK H. ALLEN, Crystallographic Data Centre, University Chemical Laboratory, Lensfield Road, Cambridge CB2 1EW, England

AND I. DAVID BROWN, Institute for Materials Research, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario L8S 4M1, Canada

Contents

• Abstract
• Introduction
• STAR File concepts and syntax
• The CIF Syntax
• CIF Dictionary
• Data name categories
• Looped and non-looped data items
• CIF standard codes
• Atomic site identification
• Creating a CIF
• Accessing a CIF; the program QUASAR
• Concluding remarks
• Notes
• APPENDIX I. CIF Dictionary (Core Version 1991)
  This is the explanatory text as published in the original paper. The dictionary itself may be retrieved as
  • a PostScript file retaining the typography of Appendix I
  • the ASCII file cifdic.C91
• APPENDIX II. Extract from a publication CIF
• References

Copyright © 1991 International Union of Crystallography