VCF File : strange characters in it

[Ansophie]

Hi,
I have open a vcf file containing genomic data. But when I open it is all like that : ‹ í]ësÛÈ‘ÿ¼ù+P»n·J¶1o@æJÖëŠ^–do%©-LBc’à¤mm叿@79ì‘6{¹«Êy?$Ð fº§»ý˜áwßݍÆå]5Ÿ‹ÞûÓOú¥üÃwß½9¸ýóa5™ÓáÙhZ¾¼)Çå`ñ¾˜Šé¢îýñô¨·yiP_ΣjZ÷¾-¦Åø±ÕýÅã¬Üz MgËEß½÷·Ÿ“ú¡ú|²_“³Q½èÝãºLæe1ìXÞÝ•ó~=úµìMdu\”sÿèpTÆeëòh
ÿø¯Y=T~Œ—ÃòtójKÔ¯ËE¾„±¼»8½¼Àë“r~?šÞ÷Î.

I have change the encryption and the conversion without any success.

Does somebody have any idea how to open a VCF file ?

Thanks

Anne-Sophie

[Terry R]

@Ansophie
If you read the following web page it says it should be possible to open the vcf file in Contacts (Windows) or some other Contacts app on other platforms.
https://fileinfo.com/extension/vcf
That is assuming your vcf file is indeed a “business card” (contact details). The file should be text but with a possibility of also containing some binary information if a photo is present.

Given your data does not appear to contain ANY text it may NOT be the expected type of file. No vendor OWNS a file extension so possibly some ‘exotic’ app has created this file and it is ONLY binary information. If that is the case Notepad++ will corrupt it if you try to edit it.
I think it best to first identify the source of the file before opening/editing it.

Terry

[PeterJones]

@Ansophie ,

Technically, the answer is in this FAQ.

But to be helpful: since you said it was “genomic” data, I am assuming it’s a binary file type. Searching for “vcf genome file viewer” (doing the search with less text has some potentially NSFW hits) brought me to https://software.broadinstitute.org/software/igv/viewing_vcf_files … I don’t know if it’s free or not. There’s also a VCF Tools open-source app available on github. That’s a couple of possible links.

But, in short, probably cannot do it in Notepad++, since it’s probably not a text format.

Good luck.