---
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title: roboto.formats
---
Format-specific decoding of topic data files into rows.

This package decodes MCAP and Parquet topic data into Roboto's nested row / Arrow representation: per-format parsing and read planning, field projection, and timestamp extraction. The byte-transport it builds on (HTTP range reads, local disk caching, sparse buffering) lives in `roboto.storage`; this package depends on the topic record and message-path types in `roboto.domain.topics` without depending back on the topic readers, so the readers in both `roboto.domain.topics` and `roboto.experimental.topics` build on it.

## Submodules

- [roboto.formats.fields](/docs/reference/python-sdk/roboto/formats/fields)
- [roboto.formats.mcap](/docs/reference/python-sdk/roboto/formats/mcap)
- [roboto.formats.parquet](/docs/reference/python-sdk/roboto/formats/parquet)

## Package Contents

- [FieldSelection](/reference/python-sdk/roboto/formats/fields#roboto.formats.fields.FieldSelection) (class): A field to read out of a data file, identified by its path through the schema.