ALZip

ALZip (Korean: 빵집 ) is a proprietary compression program and data compression tool of the South Korean software maker ESTsoft for Microsoft Windows. It is mainly used in Korea and Japan.

It is written in the Delphi programming language and has been for a long time, except for the free Korean language version sold as distributed as shareware. In August 2012, the manufacturer published on the website altools.com a universal unlock code, so the program is available free now again.

Formats

The proprietary, extensible standard file format provides support for Unicode, the modern LZMA compression method, strong encryption with AES and progressive compression ( "solid" ). The proposed file name extension is. Egg, the MIME type is EGGA.

The previous standard format was based closely on the Zip file format, raised its practical size limit on and allowed to use the Deflate compression method and bzip2. The proposed file name extension is. Alz, the MIME type is ALZ \ 001 The structure of this proprietary format was disclosed only by reverse engineering and the manufacturer offers no extract program libraries. The files can be read from the archive management tool File Roller of the GNOME desktop environment on Linux.

The current version reads 8:51 40 compression formats and can store in 8 formats.

The program also offers encryption of archive files using zip - 2.0, AES -128 or AES -256 and can create split archives. These functions include compatible with Winzip (when using the zip file format ).

History

Originally ALZip 1999 was developed by ESTsoft out of frustration of the employees in dealing with the English user interface of WinZip. The Korean surface was very well received and published the application later in the same year.

She was in Korea usually downloaded within less than a year for the most popular packing and data compression application and until December 2001 on the software. First time in 2002 an English-language version was released; Support for over 20 other languages ​​followed. 2004, a market share of 70 % was achieved in South Korea.

ALZip was first released for free use for everyone as freeware. As of October 2001, the free use license covered only private use and the software is free of charge for use in government now, as well as for the - from April 2002 provides - commercial use. With the published 2007 version 7, the licensing model of freeware was converted to adware. The software now reloaded at runtime banners from the internet and showed them in the user interface. From 1 December 2008, all versions were only obtained for a fee as shareware except for the Korean language. Since August 2012, the program is being provided free of charge worldwide.

Until the published 2001 version 4.9 was compressed by default after the bzip2 method; after the discovery of this fact, only the less efficient Deflate algorithm was used starting with version 5. In 2003, the secrecy of file format structure and the exclusion of third-party developers from using the format to controversy. The structure of the ALZ files was developed by reverse engineering and published on 22 October 2004 for the first time a nachkonstruiertes unpacking for the ALZ format under the free zlib license. As a consequence, various competing applications implemented reading support for the format. With Version 8, a new file format ( EGG) in 2010 was again introduced, which is now used in default and is open now documented by the manufacturer.