Compressing Files
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Compressing Files

Abstract

Understand what file compression means.

Each file has a size associated with it. Roughly speaking the amount of space a file occupies of disk is about the same as its file size. In reality, it takes up somewhat more space than this. When files are stored on a CD or transmitted across the Internet, it is important to the amount of disk space they occupy. Special algorithms (methods) have been developed to compress files into smaller sizes.

Sometimes a number of files are compressed into a single file while at other times a single file may be compressed. A compressed file can be recognised by its extension. The most common formats are zip, rar, gz, rpm and tar.

There are numerous utilities that enable you to work with compressed files. The next two examples will illustrate the use of Ark.

Compress files in a folder on a drive

  1. Start Applications->Applications->Archiving->Compression->Ark.

  2. File->New.

  3. Navigate to the directory in which you will store the archive. To save to a floppy disk, navigate to /mnt/floppy.

  4. In the Location window, enter a file name and an extension indicating the type. For example, tar, zip, gz.

    This displays the Ark interface.

  5. Click Save. This will return you to the Ark interface.

  6. Action->Add File or click the icon .

  7. Navigate to the directory in which the file is located and double click on the file. Alternatively, if you wish to select more than one file from a directory, select them as you would select multiple files and Click OK.

  8. Repeat until all the files have been added.

  9. Action->Add Directory if you wish to select entire directories.

  10. If you wish to delete a file, right click on it and select Delete in the context menu .

    At this point your screen will look something like the following:

  11. File->Close or File->Quit will automatically save the archive. Close closes the current archive but leaves the Ark interface displayed. Quit closes both the current archive and the application.

Add files to an existing archive

  1. Start Applications->Applications->Archiving->Compression->Ark.

  2. File->Open.

  3. Navigate to the archive you wish to open, select it and click OK. The files contained in the archive will be listed.

  4. Action->Add File or Action->Add directory to add additional files to the archive.

  5. To save the archive under a new name use File->Save As. Otherwise use File->Close or File->Quit.

Extract compressed files from a location on a drive

  1. Start Applications->Applications->Archiving->Compression->Ark.

  2. File->Open.

  3. Navigate to the archive you wish to open, select it and click OK. The files contained in the archive will be listed.

  4. Action->Extract.

  5. Click the navigate icon and navigate to the directory in which you wish to extract the files.

  6. Click OK.

  7. The path of the target directory is inserted into the Extract to window.

    If you had known the full path of the target directory, you could have typed it in manually.

  8. Click OK.

  9. Click Home. and navigate to the target directory to verify that the files have been extracted.

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