RIFF files may consist of nested chunks of information. MMIO services include two functions you can use to move between chunks in a RIFF file: mmioAscend and mmioDescend. You might think of these functions as high-level seek functions. When you descend into a chunk, the file position is set to the data field of the chunk (8 bytes from the beginning of the chunk). For RIFF and LIST chunks, the file position is set to the location following the form type or list type (12 bytes from the beginning of the chunk). When you ascend out of a chunk, the file position is set to the location following the end of the chunk.