NAME

    File::LibMagic - Determine MIME types of data or files using libmagic

VERSION

    version 1.15

SYNOPSIS

      use File::LibMagic;
    
      my $magic = File::LibMagic->new();
    
      my $info = $magic->info_from_filename('path/to/file');
      # Prints a description like "ASCII text"
      print $info->{description};
      # Prints a MIME type like "text/plain"
      print $info->{mime_type};
      # Prints a character encoding like "us-ascii"
      print $info->{encoding};
      # Prints a MIME type with encoding like "text/plain; charset=us-ascii"
      print $info->{mime_with_encoding};
    
      my $file_content = read_file('path/to/file');
      $info = $magic->info_from_string($file_content);
    
      open my $fh, '<', 'path/to/file' or die $!;
      $info = $magic->info_from_handle($fh);

DESCRIPTION

    The File::LibMagic is a simple perl interface to libmagic from the file
    package (version 4.x or 5.x). You will need both the library
    (libmagic.so) and the header file (magic.h) to build this Perl module.

 Installing libmagic

    On Debian/Ubuntu run:

        sudo apt-get install libmagic-dev

    On Mac you can use homebrew (http://brew.sh/):

        brew install libmagic

 Specifying lib and/or include directories

    On some systems, you may need to pass additional lib and include
    directories to the Makefile.PL. You can do this with the `--lib` and
    `--include` parameters:

        perl Makefile.PL --lib /usr/local/lib --include /usr/local/include

    You can pass these parameters multiple times to specify more than one
    location.

API

    This module provides an object-oriented API with the following methods:

 File::LibMagic->new()

    Creates a new File::LibMagic object.

    Using the object oriented interface only opens the magic database once,
    which is probably most efficient for repeated uses.

    Each File::LibMagic object loads the magic database independently of
    other File::LibMagic objects, so you may want to share a single object
    across many modules.

    This method takes the following named parameters:

      * magic_file

      This should be a string or an arrayref containing one or more magic
      files.

      If a file you provide doesn't exist the constructor will throw an
      exception, but only with libmagic 4.17+.

      If you don't set this parameter, the constructor will throw an
      exception if it can't find any magic files at all.

      Note that even if you're using a custom file, you probably also want
      to use the standard file (/usr/share/misc/magic on my system, yours
      may vary).

      * follow_symlinks

      If this is true, then calls to $magic->info_from_filename will follow
      symlinks to the real file.

      * uncompress

      If this is true, then compressed files (such as gzip files) will be
      uncompressed, and the various info_from_* methods will return info
      about the uncompressed file.

 $magic->info_from_filename('path/to/file')

    This method returns info about the given file. The return value is a
    hash reference with four keys:

      * description

      A textual description of the file content like "ASCII C program
      text".

      * mime_type

      The MIME type without a character encoding, like "text/x-c".

      * encoding

      Just the character encoding, like "us-ascii".

      * mime_with_encoding

      The MIME type with a character encoding, like "text/x-c;
      charset=us-ascii". Note that if no encoding was found, this will be
      the same as the mime_type key.

 $magic->info_from_string($string)

    This method returns info about the given string. The string can be
    passed as a reference to save memory.

    The return value is the same as that of $mime->info_from_filename().

 $magic->info_from_handle($fh)

    This method returns info about the given filehandle. It will read data
    starting from the handle's current position, and leave the handle at
    that same position after reading.

DISCOURAGED APIS

    This module offers two different procedural APIs based on optional
    exports, the "easy" and "complete" interfaces. There is also an older
    OO API still available. All of these APIs are discouraged, but will not
    be removed in the near future, nor will using them cause any warnings.

    I strongly recommend you use the new OO API. It's simpler than the
    complete interface, more efficient than the easy interface, and more
    featureful than the old OO API.

 The Old OO API

    This API uses the same constructor as the current API.

      * $magic->checktype_contents($data)

      Returns the MIME type of the data given as the first argument. The
      data can be passed as a plain scalar or as a reference to a scalar.

      This is the same value as would be returned by the file command with
      the -i switch.

      * $magic->checktype_filename($filename)

      Returns the MIME type of the given file.

      This is the same value as would be returned by the file command with
      the -i switch.

      * $magic->describe_contents($data)

      Returns a description (as a string) of the data given as the first
      argument. The data can be passed as a plain scalar or as a reference
      to a scalar.

      This is the same value as would be returned by the file command with
      no switches.

      * $magic->describe_filename($filename)

      Returns a description (as a string) of the given file.

      This is the same value as would be returned by the file command with
      no switches.

 The "easy" interface

    This interface is exported by:

      use File::LibMagic ':easy';

    This interface exports two subroutines:

      * MagicBuffer($data)

      Returns the description of a chunk of data, just like the
      describe_contents method.

      * MagicFile($filename)

      Returns the description of a file, just like the describe_filename
      method.

 The "complete" interface

    This interface is exported by:

      use File::LibMagic ':complete';

    This interface exports several subroutines:

      * magic_open($flags)

      This subroutine opens creates a magic handle. See the libmagic man
      page for a description of all the flags. These are exported by the
      :complete import.

        my $handle = magic_open(MAGIC_MIME);

      * magic_load($handle, $filename)

      This subroutine actually loads the magic file. The $filename argument
      is optional. There should be a sane default compiled into your
      libmagic library.

      * magic_buffer($handle, $data)

      This returns information about a chunk of data as a string. What it
      returns depends on the flags you passed to magic_open, a description,
      a MIME type, etc.

      * magic_file($handle, $filename)

      This returns information about a file as a string. What it returns
      depends on the flags you passed to magic_open, a description, a MIME
      type, etc.

      * magic_close($handle)

      Closes the magic handle.

EXCEPTIONS

    This module can throw an exception if your system runs out of memory
    when trying to call magic_open internally.

SUPPORT

    Please submit bugs to the CPAN RT system at
    http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=File-LibMagic or via email at
    bug-file-libmagic@rt.cpan.org.

BUGS

    This module is totally dependent on the version of file on your system.
    It's possible that the tests will fail because of this. Please report
    these failures so I can make the tests smarter. Please make sure to
    report the version of file on your system as well!

DEPENDENCIES/PREREQUISITES

    This module requires file 4.x or file 5x and the associated libmagic
    library and headers (http://darwinsys.com/file/).

RELATED MODULES

    Andreas created File::LibMagic because he wanted to use libmagic (from
    file 4.x) File::MMagic only worked with file 3.x.

    File::MimeInfo::Magic uses the magic file from freedesktop.org which is
    encoded in XML, and is thus not the fastest approach. See
    http://mail.gnome.org/archives/nautilus-list/2003-December/msg00260.html
    for a discussion of this issue.

    File::Type uses a relatively small magic file, which is directly hacked
    into the module code. It is quite fast but the database is quite small
    relative to the file package.

AUTHORS

      * Andreas Fitzner

      * Michael Hendricks <michael@ndrix.org>

      * Dave Rolsky <autarch@urth.org>

CONTRIBUTORS

      * E. Choroba <choroba@matfyz.cz>

      * Mithun Ayachit <mayachit@amfam.com>

      * Olaf Alders <olaf@wundersolutions.com>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

    This software is copyright (c) 2015 by Andreas Fitzner, Michael
    Hendricks, and Dave Rolsky.

    This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
    the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.

