Default file compression formats in OS X?

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Scott - 31 Aug 2007 01:39 GMT

I'm not a Mac user.

I'm a Linux user that may be sending a lot of files to a few Mac users.

I'd like to know what compression formats OS X supports "out of the box".

I understand you can compress/decompress gzipped tarballs in a terminal,
but I'm specifically wanting to know what you can do outside of a
terminal (just in the GUI).

My first guesses would be compressing/decompressing .zip .gz and .tar.gz.

Is that correct?

TIA

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Warren Oates - 31 Aug 2007 02:30 GMT

> My first guesses would be compressing/decompressing .zip .gz and .tar.gz.
>
> Is that correct?

Those all work fine. You can just double-click, and the file will
decompress.

There are also compressed disk images (.dmg) which is how most software
is distributed for the Mac now, and which you double-click to mount. You
can create them on any OS X Mac with the Disk Utility program.

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W. Oates

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Jolly Roger - 31 Aug 2007 02:56 GMT

>> My first guesses would be compressing/decompressing .zip .gz and .tar.gz.
>>
>> Is that correct?
>
> Those all work fine. You can just double-click, and the file will
> decompress.

Keep in mind the only one you can *create* through the Mac OS X
graphical user interface is a ZIP file (right-click an item and choose
Create Archive). To create a TAR or TGZ, you'd need to use a
third-party utility or the command line.

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Scott - 31 Aug 2007 03:09 GMT

Jolly Roger spake thusly:

>>> My first guesses would be compressing/decompressing .zip .gz and
>>> .tar.gz.
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Create Archive). To create a TAR or TGZ, you'd need to use a
> third-party utility or the command line.

Thanks. That answered my other question.

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Warren Oates - 31 Aug 2007 13:09 GMT

> Thanks. That answered my other question.

The CLI and GUI work together nicely for this though. If you drag a file
or folder into a "terminal window," the OS will write out the path for
you. So you can

tar cvf foo.tar [now drag your file in]

Bzip2 works as well.

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Scott - 31 Aug 2007 14:33 GMT

Warren Oates spake thusly :

>> Thanks. That answered my other question.
>
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
>
> Bzip2 works as well.

My Mac using friend is old school Mac and therefore
"command-line-challanged".

In fact, she still prefers OS 9 over OS X.....

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Scott - 31 Aug 2007 03:08 GMT

Warren Oates spake thusly:

>> My first guesses would be compressing/decompressing .zip .gz and .tar.gz.
>>
>> Is that correct?
>
> Those all work fine. You can just double-click, and the file will
> decompress.

Cool. Now how about the opposite? Compressing a file.

> There are also compressed disk images (.dmg) which is how most software
> is distributed for the Mac now, and which you double-click to mount. You
> can create them on any OS X Mac with the Disk Utility program.

Those I'm aware of, but I'm speaking in terms of cross-platform
functionality.

Thanks

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Mac Forum / General / General / August 2007

Default file compression formats in OS X?