amigainfo

A Python library for loading, saving and converting Amiga .info icon files.

Supports five generations of the format:

• 🗺️ Classic (OS 1.x-3.1) — planar bitmap icons
• 🖼️ NewIcons — higher colour icons encoded in ToolTypes strings
• 🪟 GlowIcons / ColorIcons (OS 3.5+) — IFF FORM ICON with RLE compression
• 📷 ARGB (OS4) — 32-bit icons with zlib-compressed ARGB data
• 🖼️ PowerIcons (OS4) — two concatenated PNG files with metadata in an icOn chunk

Links

• 🏠 home
• 💬 blog post
• 📚 pydoc
• 🐍 pypi
• 🐱 github

Install

pip install amigainfo

Library usage

from amigainfo import load, save, to_image

# Load and render the best available image
obj = load(open("MyApp.info", "rb").read())
img = to_image(obj)
img.save("MyApp.png")

# Access metadata
print(obj.type)          # IconType.TOOL
print(obj.default_tool)  # "SYS:Utilities/MultiView"
print(obj.tooltypes)     # ["PUBSCREEN=Workbench", ...]

# Modify and save back
obj.default_tool = "SYS:Utilities/NewTool"
obj.tooltypes.append("DONOTWAIT")
open("MyApp.info", "wb").write(save(obj))

# Render a specific format or state
from amigainfo import classic_to_image, WB_1X

img = classic_to_image(obj.classic.normal, palette=WB_1X)
img = to_image(obj, selected=True)

CLI

Inspect .info files (default):

# Human-readable summary (default action)
amigainfo icon.info

# Multiple files
amigainfo *.info

# JSON metadata
amigainfo --json icon.info

Convert to PNG with -o:

# Convert to PNG (picks the best available image format)
amigainfo -o icon.png icon.info

# Batch convert to a directory
amigainfo -o output_dir/ *.info

# Use the selected (highlighted) icon state
amigainfo -o icon.png --selected icon.info

# Extract a specific format layer
amigainfo -o icon.png --format classic icon.info
amigainfo -o icon.png --format newicon icon.info
amigainfo -o icon.png --format coloricon icon.info
amigainfo -o icon.png --format argb icon.info
amigainfo -o icon.png --format png icon.info

# Override the palette for classic icons
amigainfo -o icon.png --format classic --palette wb1x icon.info

Pillow plugin

import amigainfo registers a Pillow plugin, so you can open .info files directly:

from PIL import Image
import amigainfo

img = Image.open("icon.info")
img.save("icon.png")

# Multi-frame: all generations × states, best first
for i in range(img.n_frames):
    img.seek(i)
    img.save(f"frame_{i}.png")

# Full DiskObject metadata is available
obj = img.info["disk_object"]
print(obj.tooltypes)

Format overview

Amiga .info files are icon files used by AmigaOS Workbench. The format evolved over several OS generations, with each new format layered on top of the previous for backward compatibility.

Every standard .info file starts with a DiskObject header (0xE310 magic) containing a Gadget structure, icon metadata (type, position, tooltypes, default tool), and planar bitmap image data. Later formats append additional image data:

Format	Era	Image type	Palette
Classic	OS 1.x-3.1	Planar bitmaps (1-8 bitplanes)	System Workbench palette
NewIcons	Mid-90s	Chunky pixels encoded in ToolTypes	Embedded in data
GlowIcons	OS 3.5+	RLE-compressed indexed colour (IFF)	Embedded in data
ARGB	OS 4	zlib-compressed 32-bit ARGB	Full colour
PowerIcons	OS 4	Two concatenated PNGs	Full colour

PowerIconss icons are a separate format — the file starts with PNG magic (0x89504E47) instead of 0xE310. Two complete PNG images are concatenated back-to-back (normal + selected state), and icon metadata is stored in a custom icOn PNG chunk in the first image.

Each file can contain up to two images: normal and selected states.

Data model

The load() function returns a DiskObject with all parsed data accessible. The save() function serializes it back to .info bytes:

DiskObject
├── magic, version, type
├── gadget (Gadget: dimensions, flags, user_data)
├── default_tool, tool_window, tooltypes
├── current_x, current_y, stack_size
├── drawer_data (DrawerData: window state, OS2+ display flags)
├── classic (ClassicImages: normal/selected planar bitmaps)
├── newicon (NewIconImages: normal/selected palette+pixels)
├── coloricon (ColorIconImages: FACE chunk + normal/selected IMAG)
├── argb (ARGBImages: normal/selected 32-bit image data)
└── png (PNGImages: normal/selected raw PNG bytes)

Default palettes

Classic icons don't store palette data, they rely on the system Workbench palette. Two palettes are included:

• WB_1X — OS 1.x, 4 colours (blue, white, black, orange)
• WB_2X — OS 2.x/3.x, 8 colours (the standard Workbench palette)

The default is WB_2X. The to_image() function auto-selects based on gadget.user_data (OS 2.x+ icons set this to 1).

License

WTFPL: do whatever you want, but don't blame me if it unplumps your gf's pillow.