Gzip

GzipshortGNU Zip,GNU open-source replacement forUnix 'compress' program.

Gzipbased on'deflate' algorithm, which iscombinationLZ77Huffman coding. 'Deflate' was developedresponsepatents that covered LZWother compression algorithmslimitedusability'compress'other popular archivers.

In ordermakeeasierdevelop software that uses compression,Zlib library was created. It supportsGzip file format'deflate' compression. The librarywidely used, becauseits small size, efficiencyversatility, although sincelate-1990s there has been some movement from gzipbzip2 which produces somewhat smaller files.

The Zlib compressed data format,'deflate' algorithm andGzip file format were standardised respectively as RFC 1950, RFC 1951RFC 1952.

The usual file extensiongzipped files.gz. Unix softwareoften distributed as files ending.tar.gz, called tarballs. Theyfiles first packagedtarthen compressedgzip. They can be decompressedgzip -d file.tar.gz. Nowadays moremore softwareinstead distributed as .tar.bz2 archives because bzip2 compresses files better than gzip.

See also: bzip2

External Links

• Gzip Home Page http://www.gzip.org/
• Zlib Home Page
• WinzipGzip
• http://www.powerarchiver.comfreeware tar, gzipbzip2 utilityWindows.
• 7-Zipan LGPL licensed utility that supports 7z, ZIP, CAB, RAR, ARJ, GZIP, BZIP2, TAR, CPIO, RPMDEB.