Definitions for "Graphics Interchange Format"
Keywords:  compuserve, gif, jpeg, lzw, tiff
(abbreviation: GIF) A file format for storing images, commonly used on the web.
A bit-mapped color graphics file format for IBM-compatible computers. GIF is used to exchange graphics on bulletin boards because of its efficient compression technique for high-resolution graphics.
GIF is a bitmap image format for pictures and animations that use 256 (or fewer) distinct colors. GIFs are compressed files, and employed specifically to reduce the amount of time it takes to transfer them over a network connection. The format was introduced by CompuServe in 1987 and has since come into widespread usage on the World Wide Web. See Also: ( JPEG) JPEG, ( PNG) Portable Network Graphics, ( TIFF) Tagged Image File Format