> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.snomed.org/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.snomed.org/snomed-ct-specifications/snomed-ct-release-file-specification/release-types-packages-and-files/3.1-common-features-of-all-release-files/3.1.1-general-structure-of-release-files.md).

# General Structure of Release Files

The following rules apply to all SNOMED CT Release Files.

* SNOMED CT Release Files are UTF-8 encoded, tab delimited text files.
* Each line, including the final line, ends with a carriage return character (hex 0D) followed by a line feed character (hex 0A).
* The first line of each file, contains the names of each column (also know more generally as a field).
* Field names are represented using lower-camel-case
  * First letter of name is lower case
  * First letter of each words apart from the first word in the name is upper case
  * All other letters are lower case.
  * For example:
    * id
    * term
    * typeId
    * relationshipGroup
    * definitionStatusId
* The name, datatype and usage of the fields in each file are specified in the following sections of this guide
  * [File Format Specifications](https://github.com/SNOMED-Documents/snomed-release-file-specification/blob/main/4%20component-release-files-specification/4.2%20file-format-specifications)
  * [Reference Set Types](https://github.com/SNOMED-Documents/snomed-release-file-specification/blob/main/5%20reference-set-release-files-specification/5.2%20reference-set-types).

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