About Online INF Book Reader

The Online INF Book Reader allows you to view IBM INF files directly in your web browser.

Format reverse-engineering and reader implementation done by Tomáš Slavotínek.

Improvements & Limitations
Browser Compatibility
Version History

Improvements & Limitations

Here are some of the improvements that the Online Reader provides over the old IPF for Windows utility (IVIEW):

  • Available on all hardware and software platforms that can run a modern web browser
  • Easy copy&paste and information sharing
  • Proper ASCII-art tables (uses characters from DOS code page 437)
  • HTML export

The current version is not quite feature-complete however and has the following limitations:

  • Some less common control commands may not be implemented
  • There may be some indentation inconsistencies when compared to output produced by the IVIEW utility. This can't be completely avoided without using absolute positioning for all text blocks and doing all calculations manually (in JS). I'm letting the layout engine to do most of the work, as it greatly simplifies the implementation and the produced output is close enough to what IVEW outputs.
  • Full-text search not implemented currently

Browser Compatibility

The Online INF Book Reader has been tested in the following browsers:

  • Chrome 49, 80 – 101
  • Firefox 52 ESR, and 72 – 83
  • Opera 66 – 72
  • Edge 79 – 87
  • Safari 13
  • Internet Explorer 11

The viewer isn't currently optimized for use with mobile/touch devices. The application should work in most modern mobile browsers, but the UI may be hard to use and the displayed information may have sizing issues.

Version History

version 0.8b (09 May 2022)

  • fixes for INF files w/o "header 2" (i.e. some PS/2 Assistant files)
  • fix for empty INF files (i.e. some PS/2 Assistant title files)

version 0.8a (22 Nov 2020)

  • the back/forward feature now uses the native browser history
  • page URL now auto-updates to match the currently displayed article/section
  • removed the back/forward buttons (use browser navigation instead)
  • removed the "copy section URL" button (copy it from the address bar when needed)
  • other minor changes

version 0.8 (12 Oct 2020)

  • added support for Japanese code page 932

version 0.7 (07 Jul 2020)

  • implemented command 0x1F - external link (cross-INF)
  • fixed index indentation bug
  • added forward button (2-way history)

version 0.6 (16 Jun 2020)

  • implemented commands 0x17 and 0x18 - start and end of hidden text
  • fixed index not being parsed correctly for some files
  • added splitters - the views can be resized now

version 0.5a (11 Jun 2020)

  • fixed behavior of empty align blocks

version 0.5 (11 May 2020)

  • implemented special code 0xFB - centered block
  • implemented command 0x10 - shell command (not actually executed, only displayed)
  • added support for the "BA" image header (wrapper header; skipped)
  • fixed an issue where continuous styles wouldn't get re-applied/terminated correctly on text blocks with multi-level indentations
  • image commands in files with no image table are silently ignored now
  • reworked layout of the header area; fixes an issue where very long section names affected the UI layout
  • some minor UX improvements

version 0.4 (24 Mar 2020)

  • implemented command 0x13 - font color
  • implemented command 0x14 - background color
  • fixed line height inconsistencies with monospaced text (partially)
  • reworked layout of the footer area
  • reworked parser notifications

version 0.3a (22 Feb 2020)

  • reworked page layout/styles for better compatibility (Safari, older browsers)
  • added "About" page

version 0.3 (31 Jan 2020)

  • added support for local INF files ("Open Local File")
  • added support for DOS code page 850
  • added "Save Section as HTML" button
  • implemented Index support
  • implemented Font Table support
  • implemented command 0x0E - color (partially - background component not working)
  • implemented command 0x0F - image link
  • implemented command 0x11 - indentation with optional new line
  • implemented command 0x1C - indentation at current text position
  • reworked command 0x19 - set font
  • fixed command 0x12 - indentation with optional new line
  • fixed "table of contents" not being parsed properly for some files
  • added support for inline pictures
  • added support for the "Id" image format
  • some other tweaks and fixes

version 0.2 (21 Jan 2020)

  • implemented support for image data types 0 and 1 (type 0 not tested)
  • fixed line alignment for 8bpp images
  • fixed monospace blocks not being terminated in some cases
  • fixed text alignment getting reset between article chunks
  • fixed an issue where only one instance of an image could be rendered
  • added "Go Back" button

version 0.1 (20 Jan 2020)

  • initial release
  • table of contents, articles/sections, and notes are functional
  • support for most common section control commands
  • support for "bM" images - 1bpp/4bpp, LZW compression