Archiving

File Formats

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Electronic File Formats

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Compression

(Lossless, for generic data + file archives)

Compression + archiving

(Multiple files => 1 file, makes it smaller)

• 7z (.7z)
• ACE (.ace)
• ARC (.arc)
• ARC (FreeArc) (.arc)
• ARC (Web archiving) (.arc.gz) See ARC (Internet Archive)
• Apple Disk Image
• ARJ
• BRU - (RSX-11M backup)
• Cabinet (.cab)
• DWC (.dwc)
• IMP (.imp)
• Jar (.j, .jar) => this is just a renamed zip file with some mandatory files
• LHAv (.lzh, .lha)
• PMA (.pma)
• RAR (.rar)
• Softlib (Softdisk Publishing)
• Spark (.spk)
• Stuffit (.sit)
• Stuffit X (.sitx)
• WARC (.warc, .warc.gz)
• ZIP (.zip)
• ZOO (.zoo)

Archiving only

(many files => 1 file, no compression attempted)

• AR file format (.a, .lib) -- Unix Archiver (ar) format as used by various compilers/linkers
• ARC (Internet Archive) (.arc)
• BagIt
• BinHex (.hqx)
• CPIO (.cpio)
• LBR (.lbr)
• Tape Archive (.tar)

Stream compression formats

A stream format takes a stream of bytes, and outputs a different, hopefully smaller, stream of bytes. These compression formats are often used internally in other data structures to compress data, as well as in network protocols, such as http. Used stand-alone, a stream compression format does not offer archiving capability, however in the UNIX doctrine, an archiver like tar can be combined with an archive format to produce a proper compressed archive.

• bzip2 (.bz2)
• CCITT Group 4
• CrLZH (.?y?)
• Crunch (.?z?)
• gzip (.gz)
• Error Code Modeler (.ecm)
• LZIP (.lz)
• LZMA (.lzma)
• LZOP (.lzop)
• LZW (.z)
• Squash - single file compression on RISC OS
• Squeeze/SQ (.?q?)
• XZ (.xz)

Self-extracting archives

(in addition, some of the other archivers are able to produce executable files for some platform which include the archived data and a program to extract them, and generally have the file extension normal for executables, such as .exe for DOS/Windows)

• SDA (Self Dissolving Archive)
• SEA (Self-Extracting Archive]
• SFX (Self-Extracting Archive)

Uncategorized

• 7zX s7z
• 9CDR - Amiga FileImploder Clone
• AFA afa
• ALZip alz
• APX apx
• ARCFS - ArcFS ArchivePacker
• ArchiveLib GreenLeaf
• bh - BlakHole
• cfs - Compact File Set
• cpt - Compact Pro
• CRN crn - compressed text files used for PC-Write manual
• DGCA dgc
• dar - Disk Archiver
• dd - DiskDoubler
• DMS dms - Amiga Disk Masher compressed file
• DUPA- Amiga FileImploder Clone
• ecc - DVDisaster Error Correction File
• FIMP - Amiga FileImploder
• F - Freeze/Melt
• GCA gca
• HA ha
• z - Huffman Encoding
• ICE ice
• IFHC - Amiga FileImploder Clone
• IMP - Amiga FileImploder
• Inflate infl
• JCalG1 DataPacker (.jc, Commodore Amiga)
• kgb - KGB Archiver
• xp3 - KiriKiri
• LZX lzx
• LNX lnx - Lynx archive, used on Commodore 64
• mar - Mozilla Archive
• ??_ - MS-DOS Compression
• pit - PackIt
• PAK pak
• PAQ paq6 paq7 paq8
• par par2 - Parchive File
• partimg - PartImage
• pea - PeaZip
• uca - PerfectCompress
• PIM pim
• qda - Quadruple D
• RK rk
• RZIP rzip
• ba - SCIFER
• sen - Scifer
• sfArk sfark
• shar - Shell Archive
• SQX sqx
• uha - UHarc
• uc, uc0, uc2, ucn, ur2, ue2 - UltraCompressor II
• ar - Unix Archiver
• wim Windows Image
• hki - WinHKI
• rk - WinRK
• XAR xar
• YZ1 yz1
• zz - Zzip