RAA File Format

The RAA file format is the archive companion of the RAE File Format: a standard ZIP archive that bundles multiple RAE files. It is used to export and transfer whole sets of measurements in a single file.

Structure

• An RAA file is a regular ZIP archive (PKZIP format) with the file extension .raa. Any standard ZIP library or archive tool can open it.
• Each entry in the archive is a complete binary RAE file containing one measurement, named after the measurement's source identifier: <sourceIdentifier>.rae.
• There is no manifest or index file — the archive entries themselves are the content.

example.raa (ZIP)
├── 0d9f4c1e-6a2b-4f43-9c1a-2f5e8d7b3a10.rae
├── 3b7e02aa-91c4-4d0f-8f6d-64c2a92f4b77.rae
└── b1a4f6d2-3c8e-45b9-a0d7-9e5c31f8e2c4.rae

Parsing

1. Open the file with a ZIP library.
2. Iterate over the entries and read each one into memory.
3. Parse each entry as a binary RAE file (see Decompression and parsing).

The RAE-level Compression setting varies per entry: some writers store the entries uncompressed at the RAE level and let the ZIP compression do the work, others gzip the RAE payload as well. Always evaluate the Compression property of each entry's File Header instead of assuming one or the other.

Where RAA files are used

• Rhopoint Appearance Elements (AE) exports and imports measurement collections as .raa files.
• PDF reports generated by AE can carry the underlying measurement data as an embedded .raa attachment, so the original measurements can be re-imported from the report itself.

MIME type

There is no dedicated MIME type for RAA files; since the container is a plain ZIP archive, use application/zip when transferring RAA files over HTTP.