New format support

[davidsplash]

what formats does everyone want supported by pa what is the best.

In my tests uha is the best format but ot widely used yet. cab is good but old and not updated anymore 7zip is good but slow at improving. rar is good but limited. zip is good. jar from arjsoft is really good. Czip from zipgenius is great. sfx support needs to be updated.

list of extra formats i think needs to be support by powerarchiver:

Uha
czip
jar (from arjsoft)
more sfx formats e.g 7zip sfx
to be able to open more instalation setups.
SQZ
Web Application Archive [Sun Microsystems Inc.]
RPM a widespread Linux package format
DEB the Debian Linux package format
sea, an Apple Macintosh self-extracting shell archive format
cpio
MAF stands for Mozilla Archive Format
ZIP2
IMP archives

is there any others you would like to see supported by pa?

[manuangi]

Uha
czip
jar (from arjsoft)
more sfx formats e.g 7zip sfx
to be able to open more instalation setups.

those are the ones I’d like PA to support!

[Randy_Bell]

I thought .jar extension was already supported

[TBGBe]

@Randy_Bell:

I thought .jar extension was already supported

No. Currently, PA supports archives with the file extension jar.
These are JAVA “archives”.

The request is support for “jar (from arjsoft)” {http://www.arjsoftware.com/jar.htm}
JAR (or JAR32) is a the name of the compression utility.

[Randy_Bell]

@TBGBe:

No. Currently, PA supports archives with the file extension jar. These are JAVA “archives”. The request is support for “jar (from arjsoft)” {http://www.arjsoftware.com/jar.htm} JAR (or JAR32) is a the name of the compression utility.

OK thanks, hehe … one is an archive, the other a utility … I get it .

[nidget]

@davidsplash:

what formats does everyone want supported by pa what is the best.

In my tests uha is the best format but not widely used yet.
jar from arjsoft is really good.

Uha and jar from arjsoft would be really nice.
I’ve used jar in the past and it was really good on the compression of data files, even better than rar (rar had a small advantage on executable files). Perhaps arjsoft should have open-sourced it to make it more popular.

[Liberty]

I agree that the following additions would be nice…
(the following are in order of priority)

UHA
JAR (from ARJSoftware.com)
CZIP (from ZipGenius)

Yes, sfx support needs to be updated… more options and one should NOT have to create a self-extracting executable as a separate task after creating an archive. I really like WinRAR’s “archiving options”, which allow one to create a self-extracting executable at the same time as creating the archive in the first place.

Ability to open more installation setups.

RPM (Linux package format)
DEB (Debian Linux package format)
SEA (Macintosh self-extracting shell archive format)
ZIP2

[TBGBe]

@Liberty:

… one should NOT have to create a self-extracting executable as a separate task after creating an archive…

You don’t - in PowerArchiver 2007

[Liberty]

TBGBe,

thanks for the heads-up. Yes, it turns out you can create an archive and make it a self-extracting executable (SFX file), all at the same time, IF you use “SFX Wizard” button.

You cannot do so by using the “Add Archive” button, nor can you do it from any of the Shell Extension options.

I am glad that the SFX Wizard doesn’t only apply to existing archives, but can also be used to create an archive and make it a SFX file at the same time.

However, I would still like to see this ability from the “Add Archive” process or as a Shell Extensions option.

The benefit from being able to right/alternate-click on a file, group of files, or folder and create a new archive and make it a SFX file at the same time is obvious.

However, why would one want to be able to create a SFX file from within the “Add Archive” process?

One simple example is…

You started to create a new archive and have named the archive as well and added all of the files/folders you want packaged in the archive. Now, you decide you want to create an SFX file. You don’t want to cancel the process you have already started, start the SFX Wizard and have to redo everything. You would like to be able to “turn on” or “toggle on” the SFX option and PA would automatically change the new archive name from NAME.ARE (where ARE is the archive extension… ZIP, 7Z, CAB, etc) to NAME.EXE. Of course, you could alter the path/name of the new file still and there would now be some SFX applicable options that would appear. If you change your mind again, you could “turn off” or “toggle off” the SFX option and PA would remember the archive type you had selected before (ZIP, 7Z, etc) and change the name of the new archive back to NAME.ARE accordingly.

I hope that makes sense to everyone.