The Shapefile format has become a standard format for saving geographic vector information. It supports polygons, lines, and points. Technical Specification.
dBase files are used to store the attributes for each layer. This is closely associated with the Shapefile format. For detailed specifications on the correct format of a dBase file used with Thuban please see the Technical Specification for the Shapefile format above.
PostGIS adds support for geographic objects to the PostgreSQL object-relational database. Different layer types (as for Shapefiles) are supported. PostGIS Homepage
Binding the GDAL library Thuban supports numerous raster file formats, see GDAL format list for details.
Most commonly used is the TIFF/GeoTIFF format: Raster maps are provided as TIFF images, with an additional "world file" storing the geographic reference (usually with an extension ".tfw").