Sat 12 Feb 2005
I’m the kind of person who learns by experience. Don’t tell me how to do something, show me how to do it. Show me an example. I find it much easier to understand things this way.
Bringing this to the context of the web and computers, everytime I’m looking for a software or a script, the first thing I look for is a screenshot or an online demo, respectively. Only after I’ve seen this is that I go read the features list, just to make sure specific features are available, in case I haven’t recognized them in the screenshot, for example. Of course, in this case, a visual aid or a demo experiece will also tell me a lot about the overall quality of the program or script. Unless something is well referred to me, I hardly ever download something I can’t see at least a screenshot of.
But anyway, I was just rambling. Actually I started this post for a different reason. Right now I’m looking for a good compression/extraction utility, link Winzip. To my surprise, I was completely unaware of the fact that Winzip is shareware. I’ve used it since God knows when, but it always came with the computer, I never actually downloaded it. Still, I seem to have been under the impression that it was free software. Well, it’s not. So I need something else. I then came across many other options, among which 2 seem to be the best ones around: FlipZip and ZipGenius. They are both well rated at many download sites and now I can’t decide on which to use.
Which compression/extraction utility do you use? Have you ever used any of these two? Please, give me some opinions! 
February 14th, 2005 at 10:52 pm
I have not used either of those, and I stopped using winzip forever ago. I use winrar, which I am now realizing is a trial version. But that hasn’t stopped it from working months upon months after the trial ended. What I like about it is that it’s unobtrusive (you can turn the explorer integration off if you want) and will open .tar.gz files, if the occasion calls for it. Of those two, I would probably pick ZipGenius. It looks cooler. I might in fact start using it, since it is freeware. Hope this helps maybe just a little
February 16th, 2005 at 7:15 pm
Give 7zip a try. It’s open source, and although they recently set up a registration option, it’s still for free. You also might want to abuse it as your favorite small file manager – (2 panel-mode) it’s kinda clone of Norton or Total Commander, but with less features and such.
cu, w0lf.
February 21st, 2005 at 1:33 pm
i use PowerArchiver. its not freeware but it i don’t mind paying for it, its wonderful.
February 23rd, 2005 at 8:09 pm
7Zip is really the BEST! I’m working on Linux and use gzip and bzip2 also, both did better compression than Zip and is 100% free. I think its also avaible for Windows & Mac …. take a look
March 2nd, 2005 at 5:59 am
I’m using Freezip, a small and fast product from Australia.
No bells and whistles, works with IE and Firefox, unzips perfectly every time.
100% free
June 6th, 2005 at 5:00 am
For compression and extraction of zip files, why don’t you just use the built-in zip capabilities of Windows XP? To un-zip, simply right click on a zipped archive and choose “Extract All..”.
To compress, select your files, then right click, and choose Send To –> Compressed Folder.
Zipping/Unzipping, and without that guilty I’m-using-shareware-without-paying feeling.
There are a few problems with this though. If your filenames contain non-US characters, then the built-in compression doesn’t work very well, and its not compatible with .tar.gz and other format.
However, for those, I would recommend Stuffit Expander from Aladdinsys.