Zlib uncompression for an idiot?

I want to uncompress a ZLIB-compressed file, without any programming skill. Could some of you give me exact help?

 

Ok, I'm going to ask you a really dumb question. OK?

Have you gone to their web site? Try that first.
http://www.zlib.net/

Without a lot of digging, I don't know if standard compression programs like WinRar or 7Zip would unzip that file or not.
At WinRar, they like for you to BUY their software, but 7Zip is FREE.

I like both of those and have them both installed on my PC, and I use one or the other almost daily.

WinRar for instance, adds lines to your Right Click context menu where you can right click on a compressed file and then just click "Extract Here" or some such. I love its simplicity.

Good Luck to you!:wave

The Shadow :cool

 

I didn't say that I want to get the ZLIB source, I want to uncompress a ZLIB-compressed file.

 

And if you get the program that creates ZLIB files, that's what you will need to UN-Compress them. Eh?

Or try the other programs I referenced to you.

 

zlib is essentially the same as zip. You could try giving it a .zip extension, and see if you can unzip it. I know that works with .jar files, which use zlib. If that doesn't work, you should be able to right-click an empty space and choose Undo rename, but I often like to make backups just in case.

 

Shadow, I think you are trying to guide me on a thing that you don't understand yourself. ZLIB isn't a program, it's a software library.

Doesn't work.

 

http://www.file-extensions.org/zlib-file-extension
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090929071446AA5t2Gt

 

This link seems to be a good place, but it's still only a library. I don't know what to do with it.

 

Some of this software says it can decompress zlib files:
http://www.freedownloadmanager.org/downloads/zlib_decompress_info/

 

The only software that seemed worthwhile couldn't be downloaded.

 

Zlib.dll is for use with both gzip and zlib wrappers for raw deflate code, but while I can find programs that handle gzip, it seems to be hard to find zlib ones, other than for png and zbm images. If I get time, maybe I can make a simple zlib command line or drag and drop decompress program. I'll have to look into it.

 

Ok. I've attached the executable I wrote rather quickly to perform zlib decompression, zdrop.exe, in a zip archive. I tested it with level 2 zlib files I made from a zlib library example. I have read that some zlib files may be from a modified zlib library, and so can't be decompressed by standard zlib, though I assume a zlib extension on the file means that is not likely.

To Compress a File:​

You may compress any file, other than a zlib file, with normal compression (level 2).
Windows Drag and Drop Mode: drag any file's icon, other than a zlib archive, onto the zdrop icon
Console Command: zdrop filename
This makes a zlib archive named filename.zlib.
You can only compress one file at a time in this version. Others are ignored.

To Decompress a Zlib Archive:​

Files with a .zlib extension are decompressed automatically without needing any switch. The new file has the .zlib extension removed from the name.
Windows Drag and Drop Mode: drag any zlib archive onto the zdrop icon
Console Command: zdrop filename.zlib
This makes a file named filename. If the file doesn't end with .zlib, it will be recompressed with a .zlib extension added. This file would need decompressing twice, instead of just once. (If you try this, you should add another .zlib extension afterwards for each compression, so it ends .zlib.zlib etc. to require the correct amount of decompressions, though it's better to use high level 3 in another program if you just need more compression.)
You can only decompress one archive at a time. Others are ignored.

Other info:​

I'd recommend that you put this file in the folder with your zlib files for easy access. For Drag and Drop mode, you could alternatively put it on the desktop, if you use it enough. For console mode, you would want it in your PATH if not in the same directory as your zlib files.

If a file already exists with a name it is trying to use, the program should fail with a message to rename or delete that file. Unfortunately, it doesn't show long enough to be read in drag and drop mode. I might work on that later, but figured I'd go ahead and publish it this way, since I might not have the time to change it for awhile. Other errors will give an empty file and another message that doesn't stay except in console mode.

Zlib.dll or zlib1.dll are not required. I built this statically, using zlib-1.2.5, so everything needed is included in this one file. [other than stuff like msvcrt.dll, which the system provides]

I tested this from XP back to Win98. It worked, with a couple quirky bugs in drag and drop mode:

1. In drag and drop mode, messages don't stay on the screen, but close automatically once the process is done. If you need to see an error message, you need to use the console mode.

2. In some old versions of Windows, file names become corrupted in drag and drop mode, since Windows gives the shortened DOS name instead of the Windows one. This means archives can't be decompressed, but files can still be compressed, though you may need to rename the archive afterward. Optionally, you can use the console mode.

I haven't found an easy solution for these, yet, though I played with a batch file and its properties with some good results, ending up with 3 files. It didn't always work on all the test systems, and sometimes introduced bug#2 to XP, so I didn't include it here.


I wouldn't risk my account here by uploading known harmful or very bad stuff, but for the sake of clarity, I'm including the following:
Legal stuff: Any use of this software is AS IS. I haven't tested it all that much, and can't guarantee that it will work. I accept no liability whatsoever. I provide no warranty of any kind.
I used the functions from the public domain zpipe by Mark Adler, but rewrote main() to use file functions with no command switches. Anyone may download this from here as freeware. If it's popular, I might try to fix it up better, later.

I hope it works.

 

I found an error in that one, so I deleted it before someone downloaded it. This one should work. Sorry to keep posting. This should be my last.

This still has the 2 bugs listed above, though.

 

Well, didn't work. Thanks for trying anyway... I quess I'll have to ask on an another place I know...

 

I could try to make it display the message better, so we have a better idea of what's wrong. I probably won't have time to do that until next week, though. I'll probably end up just adding a Press Enter thing at the end, though I find that solution to be annoying. lol

 

Nah, don't bother.

 

hey, that was just what i needed, thanks!

 

Follow up:
I found that IP Tools by Erwan's Lab contains a zlib compressor/decompressor in the menu under Tools > System > Compress (zlib) along with a whole suite of other tools in many menus.
It uses .z as the extension, while mine uses .zlib. You can rename .z files to end with .zlib if you just want to use mine, or select "Tous les fichiers (*.*)" in IP Tools' open dialog to choose a .zlib for the DeCompress IN box. (I hope they fixed that translation in the new version. ) I'm sure I could make mine able to use both .z and .zlib sometime, too.

 

Actually, lots of other programs can open .z files, like 7-zip, winRAR, WinZip, and some other programs listed in the misc section of MajorGeeks downloads.

 

NVM
The .z format that these programs open is different from zlib. My tool here and iptools are the only ones that I found to open zlib files.

 

Just wanted to say thanks for this file, it's what I was looking for also, and it works perfectly on my zlib compressed files

 

That zdrop exe you posted was perfect. We have files zipped by C1ZStreamReader ( C1Zip ) from ComponentOne, a proprietary implementation of the zlib library i suspect. Was going to be totally stuck without it. Thanks!!

 

Thank you PC-XT for zdrop.exe!!! I will be using this often so if you need the numbers to sway you towards keeping this update, please put me on that list!

 

This is an update to zlib-1.2.8.

I also refined the code, fixed a small bug that caused a crash when it was given the wrong file name (a file that didn't exist) or possibly when it couldn't create a file for some reason, and added support for the .z extension that IP Tools gives to zlib files. (As I said above, .z is actually a similar, but incompatible, compression system for UNIX, so most other .z files can't be decompressed by this tool.)

The Windows bugs are still in this version. (The console doesn't stay onscreen long enough to read error messages and old versions of windows may use short filenames.)

The following ERRORLEVEL table shows the return value for batch file or shell calls in this version of zdrop. It is based on zlib error codes:
0 success
-1 file read/write error
-3 zlib file is wrong format or corrupt (destination file truncated)
-4 out of memory
-5 buffer error
-10 invalid parameters
-12 destination file already exists

 

Sorry to beat a dead horse... any chance you want to post the source code for this ?

Thanks so much, this worked wonderfully!

 

You're replying to a thread from 2010.
If you need help, start a new thread.