Messages

26

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: October 07, 2006, 03:29 PM »

No, the first post actually doesn't answer "why pander to silly Winzip users?". It says there are people out there who still use it - and of course there are - but doesn't answer why not just tell them to get a decent, standard-supporting (and free!) archiver. There are lots of great options - Tugzip, IZArc, ZipGenius, etc, etc. Or if they must pay, get WinRAR, which is far more capable and whose proprietary format actually doesn't suck.

All I'm saying is don't put up with their crap - tell them it's crap and get them to switch. It's your duty as a lover of good software.

-JavaJones (October 07, 2006, 02:00 PM)

Sorry, you are right, I didn't say it as clearly as I thought. Given that most WinZip 10 users are somewhat new to computers they are really happy as soon as they manage to get along with WinZip that they are not likely to switch. Also, once they have already paid for WinZip, there's no point in arguing "try XYZ, it's even free!"
In general, I feel my job is not to convert people to other tools. I just accept the world as it is. 
Anyway, I believe that we both don't like WinZip and we both prefer other tools, so we don't have to act as if we were arguing. 

27

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: October 07, 2006, 11:53 AM »

Ah, but why pander to silly Winzip users? Tell them to get a free archiver that supports .7z and they'll probably have better compression *and* not have to pay for the crappy Winzip.

- Oshyan

-JavaJones (September 30, 2006, 03:31 PM)

The reasons for that are stated in my original post. 
Seriously though, it seems that PPMd ZIP support will eventually get added to 7-Zip because PKWare decided to include it into their ZIP specification (along with LZMA within ZIP although it seems no archiver supports it yet  ) See http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1580258&forum_id=45797 for details (Igor's comment near the end of that page).

Def

28

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: September 30, 2006, 08:49 AM »

So what's special about this new PPMd format?

-JavaJones (September 29, 2006, 09:56 PM)

That it is the format with the best compression that can be extracted by WinZip 10 without any addional software. 
Erm... That's all I can say about it...

Def

29

Post New Requests Here / Re: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: September 25, 2006, 01:08 PM »

Okay, okay, you convinced me. 
I hereby withdraw my wish. 

Greetings,
Def

30

Post New Requests Here / Re: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: September 24, 2006, 04:27 PM »

Thanks for your answer, wr975.
An SFX archive might just be the solution. So far I have resisted the temptation to do so, not so much because of the overhead (size of SFX stub) but because people seem to fear viruses in EXE files.
But still it might be better to send an EXE file than to support WinZip's dirty attempt to mess with PKware's ZIP standard.

Thanks again,
Def

31

Post New Requests Here / IDEA: PPMd ZIP packer/extractor (i.e. WinZip 10 compatible)

« on: September 24, 2006, 01:48 PM »

I'd like to see a free program that can create and extract PPMd ZIP archives (introduced with WinZip 10). Specification is here: http://www.winzip.com/ppmd_info.htm

Although this format is not yet wide-spread and might never be, some people do use WinZip 10, and it would be nice to send them archives that use WinZip 10's full compression abilities. A command line program is totally suffient.

I've not yet found a program that is free of charge that can create PPMd ZIP archives. The only program I found is ZipStar http://www.speedproject.de/enu/zipstar/index.html that can extract PPMd ZIP archives and which is free for personal use.

Thanks for any comments,
Def