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1992-05-06
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PKAZip, the Amiga ZIP tool!
---------------------------
PKAZip is the PKWare ZIP tool for the Amiga. PKWare's MS-DOS
product line includes:
PKZIP - The FAST data compressor!
PKUNZIP - The FAST data decompressor!
PKZFIND - A tool to locate files in directories or ZIP files!
STUPENDOS - A directory utility which provides access to MS-DOS
files as well as ZIP files!
PKAZip is all of these tools and more! It provides the Amiga user
with a fully-Intuitionized tool written specifically for the Amiga.
PKAZip provides COMPLETE support for the Amiga's file system while
retaining compatibility with PKWare's PKZIP and PKUNZIP tools.
PKAZip provides functions to create, examine, extract, test, modify,
display and print files which are in the ZIP compressed format.
PKAZip provides additional functions which support ZIP creation and
extraction. It provides full support for recursive copy and delete
to allow you to copy or delete any or all files in one or more
directories and subdirectories. PKAZip will create directories as
needed to support the copy operation and ZIP file creation.
PKAZip makes compressed file catalogs easier to use by allowing
file comments to be added to each file in the ZIP catalog. Comments
may be added or modified anytime, without the need to extract files
from the ZIP file. PKAZip offers more convenience by providing you
with a tool to change file protection bits and rename files while
they are still in the compressed state. In addition, PKAZip allows
you to attach a 255 character ZIP comment to the ZIP file to help
identify the ZIP file in the future.
PKAZip offers an inovative and powerful search feature that can
locate those hard to find files! Search allows you to locate files
by name or by file comment in any directory and most importantly,
INSIDE compressed ZIP files! Now you have the power and convenience
you need to quickly find those files.
Above all, PKAZip does all of this much faster than competitive data
compression/extraction tools while increasing data reliability with
the use of 32-bit Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC). The full-Intuition
interface provides easy to use buttons and menus to get you started
quickly! Even the experienced ZIP user will find it easy to create
and maintain large collections of ZIP files on the Amiga.
How to get started
------------------
To use PKAZip from the Command Line Interface, copy PKAZip to a
directory which is in your path. Set the Amiga's stack to at least
40000 bytes. From the command line prompt, type PKAZip followed by
the Return key to launch the program.
To use PKAZip from the WorkBench, place the PKZIP program and icon
in any WorkBench drawer by dragging it into that drawer. Double
click on the PKAZip icon to launch PKAZip.
Once PKAZip is started, you will get a message that PKAZip can not
find ZIP.PREFS and ZIP.LICENSE. This is normal at this point. Click
on the OK box in these messages. After a slight delay, PKAZip is ready
for use. Use PKAZip to copy ZIP.HELP, ZIP.LICENSE and ZIP.PREFS to the
S: directory:
- Enter the drive and directory where these files exist into the
source string box in the lower left corner of PKAZip's screen.
- Enter S: into the destination string box in the lower right
corner of the screen.
- Select ZIP.HELP, ZIP.LICENSE and ZIP.PREFS by clicking on each
filename in the central files box.
- Click the COPY button which is below the central files box. This
should copy the files into the S: directory.
At this point, you can exit PKAZip and restart the program to insure
that PKAZip is able to find the files you just copied into the S:
directory.
Under normal use, after you start PKAZip, you can either click in the
main files window (the box in the center of the screen), type in a
drive and directory name in the left directory box or use the DEVICE
button to select any physical or logical drive in your system.
Please examine the license and help files by using the LICENSE and HELP
buttons on PKAZip's main screen. These files contain additional and
useful information about PKAZip. You must have zip.license in the S:
directory to operate PKAZip.
Important Note
--------------
If you have only 512K of memory, you must assign PKTEMP: to one of
your disk drives. This forces PKAZip to create temporary ZIP files
on the disk drive and not in memory. If you have 1 Meg or more of
memory, you can assign PKTEMP: to RAM: and get a significant increase
in performance during ZIP creation or modification.
If you do not assign PKTEMP:, PKAZip will use T: as its temporary
storage location.
Zipping Files
-------------
Creating ZIP files is very easy with PKAZip! As an example of how easy
it is to create a ZIP file for distribution over a BBS, assume there
are five files you need to compress. Also, you want to save the files
and their pathnames so the person that receives your ZIP file will be
able to extract the files to the proper directories. The file you wish
to create will be named DIST.ZIP and you want to create the ZIP file
on your RAM disk to speed things up. Finally, you want to add a ZIP
comment to the ZIP file so everyone will know you created it.
Here is the list of files you want to compress:
dh0:s/script_file.txt
dh0:c/my_command
dh0:c/second_command
dh0:l/my_handler
dh0:libs/my_library
Create the ZIP file by following these steps:
- Select LONG PATH NAMES from the COMPRESS menu to force PKAZip
to store each filename with its complete path.
- Type RAM:DIST.ZIP into the destination string box in the lower
right corner of PKAZip's screen and press the Return key.
- Type dh0:s into the source string box in the lower left corner of
PKAZip's screen and press the Return key. This should display
the list of files in the dh0:s directory.
- Scroll the file list until script_file.txt is visible and click
once on the line containing script_file.txt to select this file.
- Press the COMPRESS button below the files list to activate the
compression process. PKAZip will automatically decide if the
compression technique should be imploding (best compression -
most time), shinking (good compression - very fast) or storing
(no compression). You can override PKAZip by using the FORCE
SHRINKING option from the COMPRESS menu.
PKAZip should create the ZIP file on the RAM: drive and add
a file with s/script_file.txt as the filename.
- Change the source string box in the lower left corner to dh0:c.
- Select both my_command and second_command using the mouse.
- Press the ZIP button below the files list to add these two
files to the DIST.ZIP file on the RAM: drive. These files will
be added as c/my_command and c/second_command respectively.
- Change the source string box to dh0:l and dh0:libs to add
the renaming two files to the ZIP file.
- Change the source string box to RAM: to display the list of
files on RAM: which should include DIST.ZIP. Select DIST.ZIP
and press the INFO button below the files list. This should
display the File Info Window which contains a string box which
allows you to enter the name of your BBS. This string box will
allow you to enter a 255 character ZIP comment.
Once you have entered your comment, press the SAVE button in
the File Info window to save your comment with the ZIP file.
- You are finished! The ZIP file is ready to be uploaded to a
BBS.
Extracting Files
----------------
Assume you just downloaded the DIST.ZIP file from your local bulletin
board. Also assume you downloaded it to your RAM: drive. You can
examine the ZIP file to determine if it has a ZIP comment attached to
it by running PKAZip and entering RAM: into the source string box.
Select the file and press the INFO button below the files list. This
will display the File Info window which contains the ZIP comment if any.
Press the CANCEL or ABORT buttons to exit the File Info window and
return to the files list.
You can view the contents of the ZIP file by simply changing PKAZip's
source string box to RAM: and double clicking on the DIST.ZIP filename.
This will display a sorted list of files contained in the ZIP file.
You can alternate between viewing this list with size information, date
and filename or file comment and filename by repeatedly pressing the
COMMENT button below the files list.
You can display any files in the ZIP file by selecting them and pressing
the DISPLAY button. This allows you to read the information that is
usually posted with ZIP files to help you use the programs.
As an example, assume you have examined the ZIP file and you want to
extract the files to your harddrive named dh0:.
- Type dh0: into the destination string box and press the Return
key. This tells PKAZip where to put the files during extraction.
- Assuming you are still looking at the list of files contained
in the ZIP file, you may simply select those files you wish to
extract.
- Check the Extract Menu to make sure USE PATHNAMES is checked.
This will insure that PKAZip will use any path information stored
with the filename. PKAZip will prompt you if it needs to create
any directories during the extraction process.
- Press the UNZIP button to begin the extraction process. Any
selected file will be extracted to the destination drive and
placed in the correct directory for you!
Final Note
----------
The zip.help file contains detailed information on the operation of
PKAZip. To get the most out of this program, please read this file
before using PKAZip.
Planned Improvements
--------------------
- Arexx interface or command line version
- Ability to extract Reduced files
- Encryption
- Authenticity-Verification
Acknowledgments
----------------
I would like to thank my family for their support and encouragement
during development of PKAZip. It was a long and difficult journey!
I would like to thank Bob Ballard for his support and encouragement
as well as some great ideas. I would also like to thank Bob, Harvey
Harbicht and Mike Shawaluk for their testing and suggestions.
Also, I would like to thank all of the others that have commented on
what they would like PKAZIP to be. I encourage everyone to support
PKWare's efforts to provide the Amiga community with a powerful data
compression tool. This support will encourage PKWare to release
additional tools for the Amiga.
Dennis Hoffman
Safe Harbor BBS (414) 544-6567