When do you use a zip file

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Zip files can be used for a lot different things. File compression, encryption, split archives, and more are all just a few clicks away once you understand the different things that zip archives are capable of.

Photo by Clare Bell. Think of the way a folder works in Windows. You drop contents into a folder to organize your files, and then you can transport that folder to any location on your computer, and the files inside of it go with it. What if you have a folder that contains 20 files, and need to email it to someone? This is where the definition of a zip file ends for most people. What you may not realize is that you can do much more than just compress and combine files with zip archives.

To create a zip file, right-click in a blank area on your desktop or in explorer, go to new, and select Compressed zipped Folder. With the zip file created, just select and drag your files into the zip folder. As you can see in the screenshot, the files are copied into the zip folder, and not moved or deleted from their original location. Now, you can transfer, backup, or do whatever else you want with your zipped contents. A new window will open up and you can select where you want the files to be extracted.

By default, it will extract the contents to the same directory in which your zip file resides. Just hit extract and a folder will be created that has all of the zipped files in it. There are a bunch of programs out there that offer additional functions for zip files, but one of the most lightweight, feature-packed, and efficient is 7-Zip.

Click that link to be taken to their website and download the latest version of the program. Installation is straightforward, just accept the license agreement and click next until 7-Zip is installed. After that, you should be able to highlight files, right-click them, and add them to a zip archive with 7-Zip.

Remember to use a strong password, so brute force and dictionary attacks become useless. ZipCrypto vs. ZipCrypto is weak but has fewer compatibility issues. AES is much stronger but only works with newer systems or with those that have 7-Zip installed. Try to choose AES when possible. Encrypting file names — Sometimes file names can be just as important as the contents inside of a file. This article looks at some of the reasons why zipping files is important. Most software developers choose to use zip archive format to compress software files so that they will be easy to upload to the internet.

Here are some of the reasons you should consider zipping your files. When zipping files to save storage space, you should keep in mind that some file types like JPEG images are already highly compressed. ZIP or. The icon that represents the file would also change. Say you have a photo named vacation.

After you zip this photo it now read vacation. While this smaller size is a positive, it also takes longer to process. It is also less convenient in that you need to download and install a software application to use. ZIP files encode information into fewer bits by removing redundant data. Each word in this file appears twice. Now, if each letter and space in the sentence equals one unit of memory, then the entire file size would be units.

But you can create a numbered code to express the data in a different way:. Or to put it a different way, both sentences would now read: This means that the initial file size of units is reduced to 18 units, which is a massive savings. The ZIP file format uses lossless compression algorithms to do exactly that. It allows you to express the same information in a more efficient way by removing the redundant data from the file.

This also means it is faster to send a ZIP file. There are a broad range of potential uses for zipped files in a business setting. Being able to send large numbers of files over email is imperative. Say you need to send a big batch of files to a colleague or client. If you try to send them all at once in an email attachment, you will get an error message because of file size.