The Graphics Interchange Format is a bitmap image format, developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe led by American computer scientist Steve Wilhite on June 15, 1987. It has since come into widespread usage on the World Wide Web due to its wide support and portability between many applications and operating systems; the format supports up to 8 bits per pixel for each image, allowing a single image to reference its own palette of up to 256 different colors chosen from the 24-bit RGB color space. It supports animations and allows a separate palette of up to 256 colors for each frame; these palette limitations make GIF less suitable for reproducing color photographs and other images with color gradients, but it is well-suited for simpler images such as graphics or logos with solid areas of color. Unlike video, the GIF file format does not support audio. GIF images are compressed using the Lempel–Ziv–Welch lossless data compression technique to reduce the file size without degrading the visual quality.

This compression technique was patented in 1985. Controversy over the licensing agreement between the software patent holder and CompuServe in 1994 spurred the development of the Portable Network Graphics standard. By 2004 all the relevant patents had expired. CompuServe introduced GIF on June 15, 1987 to provide a color image format for their file downloading areas, replacing their earlier run-length encoding format, black and white only. GIF became popular because it used LZW data compression, more efficient than the run-length encoding that formats such as those used by PCX and MacPaint, large images could therefore be downloaded in a reasonably short time with slow modems; the original version of GIF was called 87a. In 1989, CompuServe released an enhanced version, called 89a, which added support for animation delays, transparent background colors, storage of application-specific metadata; the 89a specification supports incorporating text labels as text, but as there is little control over display fonts, this feature is not used.

The two versions can be distinguished by looking at the first six bytes of the file, when interpreted as ASCII, read "GIF87a" and "GIF89a", respectively. CompuServe encouraged the adoption of GIF by providing downloadable conversion utilities for many computers. By December 1987, for example, an Apple IIGS user could view pictures created on an Atari ST or Commodore 64. GIF was one of the first two image formats used on Web sites, the other being the black-and-white XBM. In September 1995 Netscape Navigator 2.0 added the ability for animated GIFs to loop. The feature of storing multiple images in one file, accompanied by control data, is used extensively on the Web to produce simple animations; the optional interlacing feature, which stores image scan lines out of order in such a fashion that a downloaded image was somewhat recognizable helped GIF's popularity, as a user could abort the download if it was not what was required. In May 2015 Facebook added support for GIF. In January 2018 Instagram added GIF stickers to the story mode.

As a noun, the word GIF is found in the newer editions of many dictionaries. In 2012, the American wing of the Oxford University Press recognized GIF as a verb as well, meaning "to create a GIF file", as in "GIFing was perfect medium for sharing scenes from the Summer Olympics"; the press's lexicographers voted it their word of the year, saying that GIFs have evolved into "a tool with serious applications including research and journalism". The creators of the format pronounced the word as "jif" with a soft "G" as in "gym". Steve Wilhite says that the intended pronunciation deliberately echoes the American peanut butter brand Jif, CompuServe employees would say "Choosy developers choose GIF", spoofing this brand's television commercials; the word is now widely pronounced with a hard "G" as in "gift". In 2017, an informal poll on programming website Stack Overflow showed some numerical preference for hard-"G" pronunciation among respondents in eastern Europe, though both soft-"G" and enunciating each letter individually were found to be popular in Asia and emerging countries.

The American Heritage Dictionary cites both, indicating "jif" as the primary pronunciation, while Cambridge Dictionary of American English offers only the hard-"G" pronunciation. Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary and the OED cite both pronunciations, but place "gif" in the default position; the New Oxford American Dictionary gave only "jif" in its 2nd edition but updated it to "jif, gif" in its 3rd edition. The disagreement over the pronunciation led to heated Internet debate. On the occasion of receiving a lifetime achievement award at the 2013 Webby Award ceremony, Wilhite rejected the hard-"G" pronunciation, his speech led to 17,000 posts on Twitter and 50 news articles; the White House and TV program Jeopardy! entered the debate during 2013. In February 2020, The J. M. Smucker Company, the owners of the Jif peanut butter brand, partnered with animated image database and search engine Giphy to release a limited-edition "Jif vs. GIF" jar of Jif peanut butter that has a label humorously declaring the soft-"G" pronunciation to refer to the peanut butter, GIF to be pronounced with the hard-"G" pronunciation.

GIFs are suitable for sharp-edged line art with a limited number such as logos. This takes advantage of the format's lossless compression, which favors flat areas of uniform color with well defined edges. GIFs may be used to store

The 2nd Central American and Caribbean Junior Championships was held in Xalapa, Mexico, on 26–29 August 1976. The city was the host of the inaugural CAC senior championships in May, 1967. Although one website states:"Under 17 events were first included on the programme of the biennial Central American and Caribbean Junior Championships in 1978," another website displays results for under-17 events in 1976. In the junior category, Cuba won most gold medals, while host country Mexico was the overall leader in total medals. In the under-20 men category, both Luis Alex Misiniak and David Giralt from Cuba won 3 golds and, respectively. Another Cuban fellow, Juan Martínez and Bahamian Rickey Moxey respectively. In the under-20 women category, Ileana Hocking from Puerto Rico, who won a gold and a silver medal at the 1974 championships in Maracaibo, gained a total of 5 medals, 4 golds and one bronze. Ann Adams from Trinidad and Tobago gained 3 golds, whereas Esther Vega from Puerto Rico won two golds and two silvers, Jennifer Swanston from Barbados won two golds.

Ernesto Canto from Mexico, future gold medallist in the men's 20 kilometre walk event at the 1984 Summer Olympics held in Los Angeles, defended his title and gained the gold medal in the 10,000 metres track walk event. And María Caridad Colón from Cuba, future gold medallist in Javelin Throw at the 1980 Summer Olympics held in Moscow, Soviet Union, won gold in Javelin Throw and bronze in the Shot Put event. Medal winners are published by category: Junior A, Junior A, Female. * Host nation Detailed result lists can be found on the World Junior Athletics History website. An unofficial count yields the number of about 127 athletes from about 11 countries: Official CACAC Website World Junior Athletics History

The AGM-179 Joint Air-to-Ground Missile is a U. S. military program to develop an air-to-surface missile to replace the current air-launched BGM-71 TOW, AGM-114 Hellfire, AGM-65 Maverick missiles. The U. S. Army and Marine Corps plan to buy thousands of JAGMs; the Joint Air-to-Ground Missile program is a follow-on from the unsuccessful AGM-169 Joint Common Missile program, cancelled due to budget cuts. JAGM will share the same objectives and technologies as JCM but will be developed over a longer time scale. AH-64 Apache MQ-1C Gray Eagle MH-60R/S Seahawk AH-1Z Viper OH-58F Kiowa United States: The JAGM was intended for joint service with the U. S. Army, U. S. Navy, the U. S. Marine Corps by providing a single missile configuration for many platforms. JAGM offered the services reduced logistics support costs. In February 2012, the Navy and Marine Corps terminated their investment in the program, saying it was a "manageable risk" to do so and that they would instead focus on the GBU-53/B SDB II and continued Hellfire procurement, making the JAGM an Army-only program.

In March 2014, they re-entered the program, with documents showing integration of the missile onto Marine AH-1Z helicopters. In June 2007 the US Defense Department released a draft request for proposals launching a competition for the Joint Air to Ground Missile program. In 2008, Raytheon and Boeing teamed up on a $125 million contract, Lockheed Martin received a $122 million technology development contract for the Joint Air-to-Ground Missile system; the 27-month contracts from the U. S. Army's Aviation and Missile Command is for a competitive risk-reduction phase; each team submitted its proposal in the spring of 2011, with contract award expected in the first quarter of 2012. However, in September the Army and Navy requested the JAGM program be terminated. JAGM survived a budget reduction in 2012 with reduced funding. In 2012, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon received contracts from the U. S. Army to extend the JAGM technology development program including the design and demonstration phases for the JAGM guidance section.

In 2013, the Army announced it would not award Raytheon a contract for the remainder of the Technology Development phase and will continue with Lockheed's contract. In 2015, the Army issued an RFP for a JAGM guidance section upgrade. Lockheed Martin was to offer its dual-mode laser and millimeter wave radar seeker, Raytheon may submit its tri-mode seeker which adds imaging infrared if it chooses to compete. Lockheed Martin was awarded a $66 million engineering and manufacturing contract to combine its laser and millimeter wave seekers into the Hellfire Romeo missile body. Raytheon retains its tri-mode seeker should the Army request it; the designation AGM-179 was assigned to the JAGM program. A Low-Rate Initial Production contract for JAGM was approved in 2018. Naval Air Systems Command List of missiles by country Brimstone missile Spike Precision Attack Air-to-Surface Missile Army RDT&E 2009 Budget Item Justification Army RDT&E 2010 Budget Item Justification U. S. Navy NAVAIR JAGM page Lockheed Martin JAGM page Raytheon JAGM page 2012 Army Weapon Systems Handbook - JAGM HELLFIRE II Missile