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Archive format

DEB converter

A .deb file is the installable package format used by Debian, Ubuntu, and every distribution derived from them. Underneath the extension it is a plain Unix ar archive holding three members: a format marker, a compressed control archive of metadata and maintainer scripts, and a compressed data archive of the files that land on disk.

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Drop DEB files here

Batch files can each use a different output. Nothing uploads for local conversions.

Working inputs include camera RAW, browser-local audio/video, PDF, CBZ/CBR comics, office documents, ebooks, markup, 3D models, structured text, images, and archives.

Where DEB comes from

Debian's first packages in 1993 used a bespoke layout produced by Ian Murdock's early tooling. The ar-based structure arrived with dpkg 0.93.76 in 1995 and has not broken compatibility since, which is why a current dpkg still opens packages built decades ago. The inner archives moved from gzip to xz as compression improved, and zstd followed for faster installs.

How DEB works

  • The outer container is a Unix ar archive whose first member, debian-binary, holds the format version — 2.0 for everything current.
  • control.tar.* carries the control file with the package name, version, architecture, and dependency fields, plus the preinst, postinst, prerm, and postrm maintainer scripts.
  • data.tar.* holds the payload as an ordinary directory tree rooted at /, which is why extracting one yields usr/bin, usr/share, and friends.
  • Both inner archives may use gzip, xz, bzip2, or zstd, so a single package can mix compressors between its control and data members.
  • Signatures live outside the file: Debian signs repository Release files rather than individual packages.

When to use DEB

  • Pulling a single binary or data file out of a package without installing it or touching the system.
  • Inspecting what a downloaded package would write to disk before trusting it.
  • Repackaging a vendor-supplied package for an environment that expects a plain ZIP or TAR.
  • Recovering configuration or documentation files from an old package that no longer installs.

Strengths and limitations

Strengths

  • A stable, documented container that has not broken compatibility in three decades.
  • Ordinary ar and tar tooling reads one, so nothing proprietary is needed to look inside.
  • Metadata and payload are cleanly separated, so the file list can be read without unpacking everything.
  • Dependency information travels with the package rather than living only in a repository index.

Limitations

  • Installing one still needs dpkg or apt to resolve dependencies and run maintainer scripts.
  • The archive-inside-an-archive layout confuses generic archivers, which often show three files instead of a tree.
  • A package built for one architecture will not run on another, even though extraction always works.

Compatibility

dpkg, apt, ar, and GNU tar handle the format natively across the Debian family, and 7-Zip, The Unarchiver, and libarchive-based tools open one on Windows and macOS. Novus Convert unpacks the ar container in the browser and repackages the members as ZIP or TAR; maintainer scripts are copied out as ordinary files and are never executed.

Package name, version, architecture, dependencies, and the maintainer script set live in the control archive and survive extraction as files. The ar container itself records only a modification time, owner, group, and mode per member.

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