Comments on: OSX zip files have extra junk http://www.onedigitallife.com/2006/01/17/osx-zip-files-have-extra-junk/ the personal weblog of paul burd, multimedia designer Mon, 12 Jul 2010 19:36:24 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Martin http://www.onedigitallife.com/2006/01/17/osx-zip-files-have-extra-junk/comment-page-1/#comment-3542 Martin Thu, 02 Feb 2006 13:23:51 +0000 http://www.onedigitallife.com/?p=912#comment-3542 Allas, nice as cleanarchiver may seem, it won't make archives that are able to store the required meta-data for some installers, even when not excluding the 'extra junk'. So, it's nice for sending images or other binary data, but useless when sending apps. But, you're right, Apple should've included a preference setting for the 'extra junk' so we wouldn't need an extra tool just to make clean archives. Now I go on in search of a stuffit uninstaller for my mac :) Allas, nice as cleanarchiver may seem, it won’t make archives that are able to store the required meta-data for some installers, even when not excluding the ‘extra junk’. So, it’s nice for sending images or other binary data, but useless when sending apps.

But, you’re right, Apple should’ve included a preference setting for the ‘extra junk’ so we wouldn’t need an extra tool just to make clean archives. Now I go on in search of a stuffit uninstaller for my mac :)

]]> By: paul http://www.onedigitallife.com/2006/01/17/osx-zip-files-have-extra-junk/comment-page-1/#comment-2799 paul Sun, 22 Jan 2006 22:59:13 +0000 http://www.onedigitallife.com/?p=912#comment-2799 Actually, I was referring to standard zip files in all 3 cases (OSX, Stuffit, and CleanArchiver). I don't use sit, or any of the other Stuffit formats. CleanArchiver gives you the option to omit the extra files, and I am assuming Stuffit does it by default. I was decompressing the files on the PC using the capabilities built into Windows XP. I don't have Stuffit installed. Apple could have given us a preference that would allow us to include or omit the extra files for greatest compatibility. The Apple mail program does this with attachments by giving us a "Windows Friendly" preference. They should have done this with zip files as well. Actually, I was referring to standard zip files in all 3 cases (OSX, Stuffit, and CleanArchiver). I don’t use sit, or any of the other Stuffit formats. CleanArchiver gives you the option to omit the extra files, and I am assuming Stuffit does it by default.

I was decompressing the files on the PC using the capabilities built into Windows XP. I don’t have Stuffit installed.

Apple could have given us a preference that would allow us to include or omit the extra files for greatest compatibility. The Apple mail program does this with attachments by giving us a “Windows Friendly” preference. They should have done this with zip files as well.

]]> By: Kooz http://www.onedigitallife.com/2006/01/17/osx-zip-files-have-extra-junk/comment-page-1/#comment-2446 Kooz Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:57:50 +0000 http://www.onedigitallife.com/?p=912#comment-2446 The extra 'junk' are the metadata that make the MacOS user experience so much nicer than Windows. The "zip" file format was not designed with Mac OS metadata in mind, so the additional stuff gets stored in the __MACOSX objects. On the Mac, the experience is seamless, but on Windows it isn't. Apple wanted to use a standard archive format, so they didn't have many options. StuffIt Deluxe doesn't have the same problem because they designed their own archive format (and it was a Mac program first), and they write both the Mac and Windows versions of the software. Their archives are proprietary and probably contain the extra 'junk' but their program ignores it on Windows. The extra ‘junk’ are the metadata that make the MacOS user experience so much nicer than Windows. The “zip” file format was not designed with Mac OS metadata in mind, so the additional stuff gets stored in the __MACOSX objects. On the Mac, the experience is seamless, but on Windows it isn’t. Apple wanted to use a standard archive format, so they didn’t have many options. StuffIt Deluxe doesn’t have the same problem because they designed their own archive format (and it was a Mac program first), and they write both the Mac and Windows versions of the software. Their archives are proprietary and probably contain the extra ‘junk’ but their program ignores it on Windows.

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