What do i do w/ an rar file?

[JOEHADENUF~MOH~ 0]

what do i do w/ an RAR file?

I downloadid an addon from CZ that was just an RAR file w/ readme... what do i do with this?

[OxPecker 0]

You tell the authir that he is a jackass and then tell him where to download a copy of WinZip.

Seriously, you can extract it with a few programs, but the best I have found is called PowerArchiver. I think you can get it at Tucows.

[bn880 5]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (OxPecker @ Dec. 01 2002,20:46)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">You tell the authir that he is a jackass and then tell him where to download a copy of WinZip.

Seriously, you can extract it with a few programs, but the best I have found is called PowerArchiver. I think you can get it at Tucows.<span id='postcolor'>

Seriously you jest.

Get WinRar, or WinAce, or that PowerArchiver.

Rar format is actually very common, so is Ace... and they can/may offer better compression.

[ralphwiggum 6]

moving to OT

[Mister Frag 0]

The VAST majority of archives found on the web are either in TAR or ZIP form, for obvious reasons -- they are de-facto standards. Windows even has support for viewing ZIP files built into Explorer.

While RAR and ACE may offer better compression ratios for some types of data, this fact is easily offset by the fact that the programs needed to read them have never been heard of by many people.

The last thing the web needs is another non-standard...

[JOEHADENUF~MOH~ 0]

so you guys are saying that i need to turn this thing into a PBO using one of these tools and then use it like a normal addon?

[Mister Frag 0]

Yes, just go to http://www.rararchiver.com/ and download WinRAR, then follow the instruction in the archive on installing the contents.

[Balschoiw 0]

as you will find out the Win Rar or Win Ace program you download will do nothing else than WinZip. The pbo or whatever files, have been packed with WinRar, so they need to be unpacked with WinRar also. Nothing different to WinZip. Only a different name and other compression method.

So install WinRar and right click the .rar file. Select open with WinRar. that´s it. Extract it to your addons folder as usual.

Note: Power archiever in my experience has great problems with .rar files, so you better stick to original WinRar to extract .rar files.

[bn880 5]

3--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Mister Frag @ Dec. 01 2002,213)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">The VAST majority of archives found on the web are either in TAR or ZIP form, for obvious reasons -- they are de-facto standards. Windows even has support for viewing ZIP files built into Explorer.

While RAR and ACE may offer better compression ratios for some types of data, this fact is easily offset by the fact that the programs needed to read them have never been heard of by many people.

The last thing the web needs is another non-standard...<span id='postcolor'>

Fortunately they are no more non-standard than ZIP... COMMON is the word. The extraction software is easily downloaded for free. Someone who has never seen the format can type in "rar extract" or similar on find out what's going on.

What ever the web needs, those formats are already around and they are used by many people. You sound like you want to monopolize everything, all into Microsoft.

And no, no fact is offset, this IS actually a bullshit discussion. The formats exist, and if someone chooses to use it then they will. There will be a chance people won't bother to extract the file or will have to think about it.

It seems like over the long run you always have a need to win some sort of undeclared technical war with me as I try and assist some people. It's like any suggestion I make has to be an argument for you about some RIGHT way, or some better explanation.

One smart ass remark after another. I don't have time for you pal, maybe I will sometime though.

EDIT: Of course I could be wrong, especially since it might be Major Fubar who makes those contradictory remarks.

[edc 0]

You need to extract it. Its just like a zip file except the author wanted to make life diffucult for you.

[Balschoiw 0]

bn880 needs backup

WinRar and WinAce cabinets have one major advantage to Zip files:

You can create multiple cabinets of one file and dont have to open up and extract them separately. The program does the work for you. This is very good cause if you have transfer errors with a big Zip file, it´s lost and you need to download it again. With smaller filesizes and multiple archives like WinAce and WinRar is able to handle this only takes some minutes to download the damaged smaller file again. Also the compression rate is much better than with WinZip.

All 3 standards are wide spread, so why discussing it anyway.

[bn880 5]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Balschoiw @ Dec. 01 2002,21:57)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">bn880 needs backup

.

.

.

All 3 standards are wide spread, so why discussing it anyway.<span id='postcolor'>

Lol, thanks

Yes I think this is a very irrelevant discussion, I don't even know why I'm participating... addiction of some sort?

Now I remember, it was because someone told the thread creator to call the .rar filemaker a jackass. That's why I wanted to clear up some things, even if it was mainly a joke.

bn880 out! (<--- temper temper)

[Mister Frag 0]

bn880, I used the term "de-facto standard" because that is what ZIP files are -- a well-documented, commonly available format for file archives with cross-platform compatibility that has been around on personal computers since the mid-80s. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm pushing for or advocating a Microsoft monopoly.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">One smart ass remark after another. I don't have time for you pal, maybe I will sometime though.<span id='postcolor'>

If you want, you can construe the last paragraph of my post as a smart ass remark, but the rest was not.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">It seems like over the long run you always have a need to win some sort of undeclared technical war with me as I try and assist some people. It's like any suggestion I make has to be an argument for you about some RIGHT way, or some better explanation.<span id='postcolor'>

I acknowledged that archivers other than WinZIP can achieve better compression -- that has never been in dispute. My point was that these less-common formats aren't necessarily in the user's best interest, since they require additional software to be installed. The fact that this thread had to be started illustrates my point.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">EDIT: Of course I could be wrong, especially since it might be Major Fubar who makes those contradictory remarks.<span id='postcolor'>

Re-read the thread and decide for yourself.

[bn880 5]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Mister Frag @ Dec. 01 2002,22:13)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">EDIT: Of course I could be wrong, especially since it might be Major Fubar who makes those contradictory remarks.<span id='postcolor'>

Re-read the thread and decide for yourself.<span id='postcolor'>

No you are right, it was you.

(Ok, hopefully that's my last post in this particular topic)

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

All this unzip stuff is kind of useless since most data can hardly be compressed. I think sometimes they deliver downloads as zips/rar/whatever to have them all packed up in a single file. I mean of course you can compress certain things but if you look at it closely the result can vary from extreme compressed to not compressed at all. What do compressors anyway? What informations of a file can be compressed?

[Mister Frag 0]

Yes, PBOs are already compressed, as are some of the things inside them, such as OGG files.

Compression relies on identifying recurring patterns and encoding them in a more efficient way. The most basic compression algorithms use run-length encoding, where a sequence of multiple repeated values gets replaced with a count and the value. Lempel-Zif and Huffman encoding are also common and able to identify more complicated patterns.

[Kegetys 2]

OFP addons generally compress rather well even with zip, so I would recommend using it, and use it instead of the PBO compression. While the PBO itself will be larger when its not compressed, zip/rar/ace/bz2/whatever can compress it alot better as their compression methods are much more advanced than what the PBO compression seems to use. Of course the PBO will eat a bit more hard drive space though but these days a few megabytes dont matter that much there...