The Translators

When telecommunicating and exchanging files with other people, especially on computers other than the Macintosh, it is common to receive archives that were created by applications other than StuffIt. These files may have to be converted into special formats to send between computers.

The Translate menu contains a list of the Translators that you have available for your use. A Translator is a special file that extends the capabilities of StuffIt Lite by adding support for the conversion of certain  files such as BinHex, PackIt™ and Compact Pro™ (to name a few). You will be able to add new translators for new file types as they become available by placing them inside the “Translator” folder in the Aladdin folder.

To use a particular translator, find the Translator you wish to use in the Translate menu, and select the command you wish to perform.

An Example Translation

Having just downloaded a file named “CoolApp.pit.hqx” from your favorite on-line service or BBS, you wish to turn it into a usable file. To do this you must apply two different translators to it. You can tell this from the two extensions (.pit & .hqx) at the end of the file’s name. A file which ends in .hqx is a file which as been encoded with BinHex4. If you look in your Translate menu, you’ll find the “BinHex4” menu item, and its two options “Encode…” and “Decode…”. Choosing  “Decode…” will display a dialog allowing you to select the file you want decoded. In the “Decode…” dialog, select the file (“CoolApp.pit.hqx”, for this example) and clicking the “Decode” button. You then will see anothe dialog allowing you to save the decoded file to another location or to rename it. A progress bar will show you how the BinHex4 translation is proceeding. After the file has been decoded, you are left with a file named “CoolApp.pit”.

When you go back to your Translate menu, you’ll find a Translator called “UnPack…”, which will extract files from archives created by a program called PackIt. PackIt archives are identified by a .pit. suffix. Choose “UnPack…”, and select the file you wish to extract from (“CoolApp.pit”, in this case) and click “Open”. A progress bar will show you how the UnPack translation is proceeding. When it is completed, you’ll have the file “CoolApp” to play with.

The Translators
The following Translators are provided for you as part of the StuffIt Lite package:
• AppleLink Package (.PKG) - for creating & expanding items in AppleLink Packages, used by the AppleLink communications software.
• BinHex4 (.hqx) - for encoding and decoding files in the BinHex4 file format. This format is used when transmitting files across the Internet.
• CPT Extract (.cpt) - for extracting files archived by Compact Pro.
• DD Expand - for expanding files compressed by Disk Doubler™. This translator requires the presence of the Disk Doubler INIT.
• MacBinary - converts Macintosh files, which have two parts (Data & Resource) into a single data file and vice versa. This translator is especially helpful if you are translating files from the Mac to the PC and back.
• UnPack (.pit) - for unpacking files archived by PackIt.