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Posted: Tue May 30, 2006 10:24
by Cutmanmike
Heh, why do you think Gzdoom has Zip support?
Posted: Tue May 30, 2006 11:10
by Alter
Why can't you just click right mouse button and click extract files and press enter?
Posted: Tue May 30, 2006 12:11
by Graf Zahl
Because extracting the files is a needless step. Why do you have to use RAR? Nobody likes it, except for the few people using it.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 4:34
by wildweasel
Personally I find that opening ZIPs as folders is counter-intuitive. Ultimately, I'm going to extract all the files from a given archive sooner or later, regardless of whether it's ZIP or RAR.
What I don't get though, is why you're going nuts over people posting RAR files. So what if YOU have to extract files? It takes half a god damn minute in major cases, usually much less. It's not like you're wasting such a big chunk of your life simply extracting files.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 4:48
by The HavoX
Graf Zahl wrote:Why do you have to use RAR? Nobody likes it, except for the few people using it.
Amen.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 4:59
by SlayeR
So links to non-zip archives on this forum will be removed from now on? I don't think I've heard anything more ridiculous in my life. But whatever.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 8:45
by Graf Zahl
Obviously some education is necessary.
Since it is apparently impossible to explain to the RAR crowd why others don't like their archive format of choice the only way seems to be to adopt /idgames's policy of not accepting anything but Zips.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 12:47
by SlayeR
That's not my point. I think simply removing links to rar files is going much too far. It's not as if they are malicious or anything, and people who have something against them can just ask for a zipped version or ignore it

I personally prefer 7z over rar anyway (since it's a completely free format, and in most cases compresses as well as or better than rar).
Graf Zahl wrote:Why do you have to use RAR? Nobody likes it, except for the few people using it.
Huh? As far as i can tell, behind zip it's the most widely used archive format.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 13:05
by Graf Zahl
No. The second most widely used format is .tar.gz. I rarely see RARs where serious development is concerned.
As for 7z, that'd be good if support for it was better. But aside from it own shell I don't know anything that supports it which makes its appeal even more limited than RAR.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 14:29
by NeoHippo
I do not believe that it is a question of which zipper is most popular or who prefers
this one or that one. While GZDoom supports only zip files, the zip format it shall be.
Or have you tried dragging a pwad as a rar file onto the GZDoom icon and got it to run?
Granted that it is not an unsurmountable problem to unzip the rar file, it is nevertheless
an inconvenience. And who likes, in this day and age, inconvenience?
Is it not a question of what is most convenient for the end user?
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 14:30
by TheDarkArchon
A straight file-size comparison, with "The Adventures of Mister Cola" as a base file since I don't have WinRAR (Base filesize: 3,345,640 bytes). I am using 7zip as my archiver and am using it's highest compression ratio settings for zipping and 7zipping.
Zip: 1,856,294 bytes
RAR: 1,567,416 bytes
7z: 1,687,739 bytes
However, I've seen occasions where 7z compresses more than RAR.
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 14:52
by Graf Zahl
How often do I have to repeat myself that this size comparison is completely irrelevant? The advangages of Zips lie elsewhere (flexibility being the most important one.)
Posted: Wed May 31, 2006 23:53
by SlayeR
A nice example of 7z is one of my mod albums
Base size: 25.3mb
Zip: 21.0mb
Rar: 16.4mb
7z: 1.09mb
Of course, it is a kinda special case since there is a lot of repeated data within the files (samples), which 7z obviously does something about.
But anyway that wasn't my point. My main point is why do something so drastic as to
remove links to non-zip archives just because you're too lazy to extract them?
Posted: Thu Jun 01, 2006 9:03
by Enjay
Presumably because Graf has asked for zips because he finds them more convenient, yet people still upload rars even when they want Graf to look at their files. Surely it's ruder to upload files in a format that the person (Graf) you want to see them can't use particularly conveniently and which Graf has specifically requested people not use? As Martin Howe said (something like) "Graf's house, Graf's rules".
Posted: Thu Jun 01, 2006 10:23
by SlayeR
I understand his reasoning, I just think his solution goes too far.