Compressed files

While less critical currently given the abundance of disk space and network bandwidth, compression can still be useful to reduce the number of bits needed to represent a file (or group of files). Common formats include .zip on Windows and .gz and .bz2 on Unix.

Creating Zip Files

Using Mac OS X

Creating archive
  1. Navigate to the folder with the files you wish to zip
  2. Select all the files you want to zip and control + click to bring up a menu (or right click if you have that option)
  3. Choose create archive from the menu.
  4. Rename the zip file with the correct name to be submitted.

Using Windows with Winzip

zip program
  1. Using Windows Explorer select the files you would like to put in the .zip file.
  2. Right-click on your mouse and choose the Winzip-->Add to Zip file...option.
  3. Type in the path name and the name of the .zip file to be created. Be sure to that the Save full path info option is NOT checked before hitting enter. The following dialog box shows you an example of this step.
  4. Click Add.

Uncompressing files

On Mac, Stuffit Expander will handle these files automatically. On Windows, Winzip will also be able to expand .zip files. However, a very nice alternative is the open-source program 7-zip, which handles a large number of compressed file types, including GZIP, BZIP2, ZIP and RAR.