zip and . rar files?
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@travisdh1 said in zip and . rar files?:
@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
In my ever growing quest to learn IT I've came across a .rar File (Winrar file -- Right? )
So what's the difference between a . rar file and a .zip File?
I thought they were the same thing more or less just the .rar file is the Windows Version of a .zip file.
And to extra the .zip you have to use winrar (?)Excuse the Noobness. Just curious.
So there is no difference - a .rar file is a zip file (both are compressed files/folders)
The only difference in the compressed file is the software you use to compress the file -
Right? or did I totally miss that ?Halfway there.
They all do the same thing, but how they do it is different. Like setting up a VPN, they all do the same thing, but use different encryption algorithms. .zip .rar and .7z all use a different compression algorithm by default. Most also let you choose different algorithms as well.
7zip is by far the best out of the ones your looking at. It's so much faster than most other programs.
Gotcha, Thanks for breaking that down.
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One thing to keep in mind about compatibility - .zip files may not require installing extra software, whereas others like .rar and .7z usually do. Take Windows for example: Windows Explorer handles .zip files OOB, but has no clue how to deal with .rar or .7z files. You need to install something like WinRAR or 7zip to open them.
Why does this matter? Say you or one of your users are trying to send someone an email with some attachments, but there is no guarantee the recipient has, or can install, extra software. In this case, a .zip file is probably your safest, most compatible choice.
I haven't really had to think about this in quite some time - I've been using 7zip for probably 10 years now.
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@srsmith said in zip and . rar files?:
Say you or one of your users are trying to send someone an email with some attachments, but there is no guarantee the recipient has, or can install, extra software. In this case, a .zip file is probably your safest, most compatible choice.
In a case like that, you would go with the defacto standard .zip extension, of which any of the aforementioned softwares can compress into, but 7Zip by far handles the process more smoothly than most other softwares.
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@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
I thought they were the same thing more or less just the .rar file is the Windows Version of a .zip file.
RAR and ZIP are both completely Windows native formats. Neither of those formats every appear on any other OS except to work with files coming from old Windows systems. ZIP is the compression for the Windows world. RAR is a weird, niche format that was popular for a little while but long ago faded away.
Everyone else traditionally uses GZ format for compression and TAR for combining files and the "tarball" or TGZ (TAR GZ) format to replace ZIP.
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@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
@scotth said in zip and . rar files?:
7zip FTW
should I google this?
Im confused.7Zip has been "the" compression tool to use on Windows for forever. Free, really powerful, absolutely no excuse for using anything else.
choco install 7zip -y -
@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
@scotth said in zip and . rar files?:
@WrCombs Yeh. 7zip is really good, opens about 4 dozen types of compressed files and is free.
Unlike Winrar which
after a 40 day free trial will have to purchase and or UninstallWinRAR is like WinAMP.... just a joke that never had a place for actual use. Goofy, pointless paid software that was never as good as what was already there and free.
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@bnrstnr said in zip and . rar files?:
If you're into Chocolatey, you can install with
choco install 7zip, too!Every company I've known for more than a decade just installs 7Zip by default everywhere so it's what everyone seems to use across the entire Windows ecosystem.
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@srsmith said in zip and . rar files?:
One thing to keep in mind about compatibility - .zip files may not require installing extra software, whereas others like .rar and .7z usually do. Take Windows for example: Windows Explorer handles .zip files OOB, but has no clue how to deal with .rar or .7z files. You need to install something like WinRAR or 7zip to open them.
Why does this matter? Say you or one of your users are trying to send someone an email with some attachments, but there is no guarantee the recipient has, or can install, extra software. In this case, a .zip file is probably your safest, most compatible choice.
I haven't really had to think about this in quite some time - I've been using 7zip for probably 10 years now.
But 7Zip is so standard and just "expected" to be installed on nearly every Windows system, most people on Windows just assume that you can send smaller 7Zip files to anyone and that they can open them .... way moreso than like a Word file.
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@scottalanmiller said in zip and . rar files?:
WinAMP
WinAMP was paid software? I do not recall that. But then I quit using it in the mid 00's in favor of iTunes (fucking mistake that was).
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@scottalanmiller said in zip and . rar files?:
Every company I've known for more than a decade
@scottalanmiller said in zip and . rar files?:
But 7Zip is so standard and just "expected" to be installed on nearly every Windows system, most people on Windows just assume that you can send smaller 7Zip files to anyone and that they can open them .... way moreso than like a Word file.
Yeah, not even....
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The advantage that I remember rar having was that it could split and then recombine an archive at the appropriate size for floppy disks. Seems foolish now but in the era of dial-up and 1.44 MB 3.5" diskettes it was a killer feature that winzip (also a paid software once upon a time, not always built into windoze) didn't have.
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@notverypunny said in zip and . rar files?:
The advantage that I remember rar having was that it could split and then recombine an archive at the appropriate size for floppy disks. Seems foolish now but in the era of dial-up and 1.44 MB 3.5" diskettes it was a killer feature that winzip (also a paid software once upon a time, not always built into windoze) didn't have.
Correct, that was the huge benefit to rar over zip in the 90’s. You are also correct that native zip support in windows is relatively recent.
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@scottalanmiller said in zip and . rar files?:
@WrCombs said in zip and . rar files?:
@scotth said in zip and . rar files?:
@WrCombs Yeh. 7zip is really good, opens about 4 dozen types of compressed files and is free.
Unlike Winrar which
after a 40 day free trial will have to purchase and or UninstallWinRAR is like WinAMP.... just a joke that never had a place for actual use. Goofy, pointless paid software that was never as good as what was already there and free.
These are fighting words here. WinAMP was the greatest. It really whips the llama's ass.
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WinAMP was THE mp3 player on Windows. Alternative was.... I can't think of anything, windows media player, classic one, if that was your thing, but that didn't play mp3 if I remember correctly. WinRAR is just a legacy app, you mostly see .rar files on torrent sites, and that's about all the use cases for it.
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@marcinozga said in zip and . rar files?:
WinAMP was THE mp3 player on Windows. Alternative was.... I can't think of anything, windows media player, classic one, if that was your thing, but that didn't play mp3 if I remember correctly.
WinAMP came out in 1997. So it did predate the main alternative, which is VLC which is vastly superior as a product, free, and open, and does so much more (like video.)
As VLC was so much more than WinAMP, and just because I remember having MP3s without WinAMP during that time, I'm pretty sure that there were MPS music alternatives at the time, just we don't remember them now. WinAMP got all the attention, but it was also pretty awful.
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@scottalanmiller said in zip and . rar files?:
@marcinozga said in zip and . rar files?:
WinAMP was THE mp3 player on Windows. Alternative was.... I can't think of anything, windows media player, classic one, if that was your thing, but that didn't play mp3 if I remember correctly.
WinAMP came out in 1997. So it did predate the main alternative, which is VLC which is vastly superior as a product, free, and open, and does so much more (like video.)
As VLC was so much more than WinAMP, and just because I remember having MP3s without WinAMP during that time, I'm pretty sure that there were MPS music alternatives at the time, just we don't remember them now. WinAMP got all the attention, but it was also pretty awful.
VLC could do playlists, queues, gapless playback for music? (not that you said it could... I'm just thinking about my favorite features)
I don't remember VLC being good for music at all, which WinAMP was so good at. What it was designed for. WinAMP was also capable of playing video, but was an afterthought IMO.
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Everybody seems to forget about (or don't know about / care for) foobar2000
Never looked back once I switched to it from WinAMP. Yeah, it's a bit minimalistic, but it plays music without being a pile of useless eye candy, so it works for me.
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@srsmith said in zip and . rar files?:
Everybody seems to forget about (or don't know about / care for) foobar2000
Never looked back once I switched to it from WinAMP. Yeah, it's a bit minimalistic, but it plays music without being a pile of useless eye candy, so it works for me.
Foobar2000 wasn't released until late 2002, and probably wasn't widely used/known for a while. WinAMP was around for years by then.
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It just hit me, Real Player was main competitor to WinAMP, loaded with adware and spyware.
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@marcinozga said in zip and . rar files?:
It just hit me, Real Player was main competitor to WinAMP, loaded with adware and spyware.
Oh gosh, forgot about that one.
