WinRar - what is it and how do you use it>

[jakesteele]

http://www.win-rar.com/shop.html

I've been downloading ebooks and there are a number of programs and formats that you are required to use, such as Adobe, HTML, etc. This one gives a free trial and mine is coming to the end and I was wondering if you know anything about this?
A

[srzss05]

7zip can extract .rar files, and is free. There is no reason to use the winrar program.

[leahcim]

I don't know why this is involved in your eBook process, but RAR is a compressed file format (like ZIP) from the 90s which some people still like for some reason. Win-rar is a utility which compresses and decompresses RAR files. As srzss05 points out, there are other options, depending on what you are doing.

[Yorikke]

7zip can extract .rar files, and is free. There is no reason to use the winrar program.

I downloaded Winrar a million years ago, never paid up, but still can use it. It just pops up a note asking me to pay, which I ignore.

Joe

[srzss05]

I downloaded Winrar a million years ago, never paid up, but still can use it. It just pops up a note asking me to pay, which I ignore.

I know the old versions did that, but I recently (comparatively, it was about 2-3 years ago) downloaded a version that stopped working after the trial date. I may still have an old version on a DVD-R somewhere, but as I said 7zip works better anway.

[runner pat]

I downloaded Winrar a million years ago, never paid up, but still can use it. It just pops up a note asking me to pay, which I ignore.

Joe

I know the old versions did that, but I recently (comparatively, it was about 2-3 years ago) downloaded a version that stopped working after the trial date. I may still have an old version on a DVD-R somewhere, but as I said 7zip works better anway.

Try right-clicking and using the context menu.

I have an fairly old version and I get no nag screen doing that .

[Dog80]

[...]RAR is a compressed file format (like ZIP) from the 90s which some people still like for some reason.

One reason is that zip has a limitation of 1024 files IIRC.

Another reason is that you can split a RAR in several smaller files, useful for example when you want to send something over email and there is attachment size limitation.

[yabob]

One reason is that zip has a limitation of 1024 files IIRC.
Not true. I just checked some zip files I regularly make, and found one with 4854 files in it.

Java .jar files are also just zip files with some metainformation included in them - you can open them with zip if you like. Java distributions and java based products might provide provide examples of very large zip archives. Looking at a java 6 JRE, I note that one of the lib files, rt.jar, is 43 meg and contains 17059 files.

[johnpost]

both rar and zip could span files for destination size limitation or use.

rar is faster and seemed to be favored.

[yabob]

A bit of research reveals that the limits on zip are 65535 files, and various 4 GB size limits. There has been a "zip64" extension to the format since 2001, extending these limits to unsigned 64 bit integer - 2^64 - 1.

[HMS Irruncible]

WinRAR doesn't just open RAR files, it opens pretty much everything. I started using it instead of WinZip after WinZip hobbled itself with that annoying nag screen, as it turns out I actually prefer WinRAR.

Sounds like 7zip is the same sort of thing, but I haven't really had a need to try it. Perhaps if WinRAR starts with the nag screens....

[mhendo]

I don't know why this is involved in your eBook process....I'm betting that the OP's ebooks are being illegally shared through Bittorrent or other file-sharing sites. Many things you find on those sites, including ebooks, are placed inside RAR files.

[Reply]

RAR gained popularity in the days when bandwidth mattered. People were still on modems when the compressor wars started.

RAR was typically assumed to have a better compression ratio than ZIP at the expense of compression speed.

That, and the pirate scene was probably too "leet" to cater to mainstream tastes in compressors. When it comes to ebooks, it's hard to imagine either format having a file size advantage (since the books are usually easily-compressed ASCII text or scanned PDFs that are already compressed using an image compressor), but tradition dies hard.

Eventually ZIP won that war from sheer popularity and ease of use, not due to any significant technical advantage. (For a while, you had to pay to create RAR archives while zipping was usually free on a shareware basis.) ZIP is pretty much integrated into every operating system today, even ones that have other native compression formats.

[leahcim]

RAR gained popularity in the days when bandwidth mattered. People were still on modems when the compressor wars started.

RAR was typically assumed to have a better compression ratio than ZIP at the expense of compression speed.

This is what I recall about RAR, too. And the "split across several files" made posting uuencoded porn to alt.binaries easier. I'd assumed that it had died out when bandwidth increased, hard drives expanded, and porn became so available no one had to put up with usenet for it any more....

...until I saw some of my colleagues using to get around an e-mail system that unilaterally blocked all zips in a ham-fisted attempt to block stupid-people-exploiting viruses.

[Baron Greenback]

I'm betting that the OP's ebooks are being illegally shared through Bittorrent or other file-sharing sites. Many things you find on those sites, including ebooks, are placed inside RAR files.

Yup, and that's usually because the original pirate upload was in small chunks of data to a Usenet newsgroup. WinRar joins the chunks back together.

Edit: D'oh well beaten

[Measure for Measure]

The downside of Winrar is that its algorithm is proprietary, though they do license it out. One upside is that it has an option for recovery records. If the file becomes damaged or corrupted, say via email or disk error, there's the possibility that it can be fixed. So .rar is preferable for archival purposes.

7z has a somewhat better compression algorithm, but it doesn't as yet support recovery records.

zip has the nontrivial advantage of widespread use.

[srzss05]

I think the point is if you want to make .rar files, you need winrar and it is not free. If you simply want to uncompress .rar files, you can use free programs to do so, which is what the OP wants to do.

[Ludovic]

If the file becomes damaged or corrupted, say via email or disk error, there's the possibility that it can be fixed. So .rar is preferable for archival purposes.But not if you accidentally all 93MB of your .RAR files.

[Swords to Plowshares]

Winrar's compression of text and PDFs is vastly superior. I noticed this when I was doing a project that requires sharing hundreds of mb of text files over the Internet.

[johnpost]

rar does not save much space on already compressed file types.

it does offer some value even with compressed files in that you can put multiple files and directories in a single (or multipart) package.

zip could do this as well.

[Jragon]

Out of wonder, how does .rar compare to 7z and .tgz/tar.gz (and tar.bz etc)? Since the discussion is drifting towards compression formats anyway...

[Blakeyrat]

Out of wonder, how does .rar compare to 7z and .tgz/tar.gz (and tar.bz etc)? Since the discussion is drifting towards compression formats anyway...

My personal opinion is that if you use anything other than .zip I hate you.

Ok, sorry, that was too extreme, but it is very, very, very annoying to have to download 7zip, install it, just because some guy who create a Skyrim mod that smooths out the face of your Khajiit happened to prefer .7z for some ungodly reason. Why wouldn't he just use .zip? Which the OS supports natively? Just to annoy me?

In short: use the standard. Even if it's slightly less efficient. Your goal is to get the files to the end-user, the end-user will love you if you use the standard they already have software for.

Extra super bonus points goes to the mod site that stored the mods in a .7z file which was inside a .zip file. So you take a look at the file extension, say, "oh finally a site that uses .zip for Skyrim mods!" then oops! Turns out you need 7zip anyway, sucker.

[Kevbo]

If you want to embed the packing and unpacking of files into a custom application, the command line interface of winrar is superior. It's higher compression ratio compared to zip is still useful as many email systems have size limitations on attachments.

[mbetter]

My personal opinion is that if you use anything other than .zip I hate you.

Ok, sorry, that was too extreme, but it is very, very, very annoying to have to download 7zip, install it, just because some guy who create a Skyrim mod that smooths out the face of your Khajiit happened to prefer .7z for some ungodly reason. Why wouldn't he just use .zip? Which the OS supports natively? Just to annoy me?

In short: use the standard. Even if it's slightly less efficient. Your goal is to get the files to the end-user, the end-user will love you if you use the standard they already have software for.

Extra super bonus points goes to the mod site that stored the mods in a .7z file which was inside a .zip file. So you take a look at the file extension, say, "oh finally a site that uses .zip for Skyrim mods!" then oops! Turns out you need 7zip anyway, sucker.

I think that the main Skyrim mod manager is built around .7z packages.

[Alessan]

I have yet to encounter a compressed file WinRAR couldn't open. It's the VLC of decompressors.

[srzss05]

I have yet to encounter a compressed file WinRAR couldn't open. It's the VLC of decompressors.

And I have yet to encounter one 7zip cannot open. Since both 7zip and VLC are free, and winrar isn't, that is a better analogy.

[Cugel]

Who da thunk rar was considered "exotic".. reminds me of those who couldn't play XviD years after it became standard practice.

[Roland Orzabal]

srzss05, I've been downloading and installing WinRAR on most every machine I've used for years, most recently about a month ago. I've never encountered a version that does what you describe. Granted, I pretty much never launch the actual program — I just use the context menus — but I've never once had it demand money.

Not saying you're wrong; there's no reason you'd say yours did that if it didn't, but I'm genuinely curious about the behavior you're describing. Do you think you could take a screenshot of what happens when you right-click and try to unpack a RAR?

[srzss05]

Do you think you could take a screenshot of what happens when you right-click and try to unpack a RAR?

No, because I no longer have the program. The website says it costs money, the OP says it costs money. Other people in this thread say (with older versions) that they get a nag screen but can still use the program. There is no mention of money on 7zip's site at all. Why use a program that asks for money to UNPACK a file when other programs do the same thing for free?

Also, even if I still had the program, I couldn't upload a screenshot as I don't have any online accounts for that, and wouldn't create one just for this.