Users and data compression
I do not want to stir up another holy war, but comments on my last post about the "compression" in RAR inspired a certain number of thoughts and arguments that I want to convey to the community. But before that, I want to note that I work under Windows, so all of the following will apply to him. Plus, I will ask you to treat the topic as information to reflection, and not as a red rag for the bull. So let's talk about data compression formats from a user point of view.
First, let's remember what compression formats we know? Well, we list - ZIP, RAR, TAR, GZ, BZ2, 7ZIP, ACE, (L) HA, CAB, ZOO, LZH, ARJ ... Plus a few more “specific” image compression formats - IMG, ISO, MDF, NRG. Maybe you remember some more, but it's not about that. What does the ordinary ordinary user remember?
There are two answers to this question - the right one and, as it is easy to guess, the wrong one. Let's start with the second - an ordinary user will call zip, rar, ace and 7z. It is not difficult to check if you look at the number of downloads on, for example, cnews.ru to describe the situation on the Russian market and on download.com to view the global market. What do we see?
')
And we see literally the following - in the world 194 million WinZip downloads, 85 million WinRAR downloads, almost 4 million downloads - WinACE and about 2 million 7Zip. As it is easy to see, two-thirds of the market is controlled by WinZip (and this when considering work out of the box in Windows XP +), almost a third of WinRAR. In addition, do not forget that WinAce is already an abandoned project, which is losing its fans.
Now back to the Russian market. Here the situation is completely different. First, we do not have a centralized place to download files. Yes, yes, try to type in " soft " in Yandex, and you will see a link to Soft.mail.ru, yes Soft.CNews, described above. Sensible ratings are not there, but we will be content with what we have . As we have noticed, WinZip is missing on both sites - they simply don’t use it in Russia, because WinRAR (33 thousand downloads, sic! ) And 7Zip (22 thousand) are preferred. The rest of the software almost does not appear, Yandex confirms the situation .
It was the wrong answer to the question “which archiver does the user use?” Now the correct answer is: “he does not know what a data archiver is”. Also, he does not know what browser he uses. And the word processor for it is equivalent to the name “Word”, and the spreadsheet software is uniquely “Excel”.
What computer is for the user? This is primarily a way to do your job - preferably quickly and less thinking about the problems that his (the user) does not concern. This, as I said above, the program in which he writes a report is a browser where he pokes on his favorite social network, this is a mailer, which is actually GMail or Exchange Express.
The last thing the user remembers is the archiver, what is (and is it worth) on his computer? Now imagine a spherical user in a vacuum to which something comes in the mail .zip, .rar, .gz, .bz2, .7z. There are several options here - in the case of a ZIP archive, the user will not even understand what happened and open it with the system’s tools, because ZIP has been working out of the box in Windows for quite some time. Pierces a couple of buttons and calm down.
Much more interesting is the situation if RAR comes to him. Turn off the brain and think about what you would do if you didn't know what it is? You would have correctly loaded Yandex (google? Turn off the brain even more!) And type something like " rar " or " than / how to open rar ". Where do you go? That's right, on win-rar.ru and put yourself WinRAR. Well, of course, if you are a regular user, you know how to install software :)
The situation becomes much worse if you (regular user) download .gz or .bz2. A simple search in Yandex by " bz2 " or " gz " will not give anything - the first lines lead to the "dense" Wikipedia. But the query “ how to open gz ” is quite nothing and will lead the user to softboard.ru, where the user will be sent for WinRAR. Or, perhaps, for 7-Zip.
There we figured out how users get WinRAR or 7-Zip. Now let's see what happened to WinZip from the Russian market segment. The answer lies on the surface - users do not know and / or do not want to use a program that does not speak their native language. WinRAR is Russified, it has a Russian site. 7-zip tries to keep up - 7-zip.org.ua/ru . You will say that WinZip also has a Russian-language page . Yes, this is true, but the user zip will open out of the box, he will not download the "unnecessary" program.
Suppose you (an ordinary user) finally understood why data compression is needed and stopped bothering your acquaintances with multimeter letters. Let's figure out what and how you will archive.
If before you only had zip out of the box, then perhaps you will find the inconspicuous menu item “Send> Compressed Zip-folder” in the drop-down menu on the right-click menu. Did you know about this item? I specifically found it for this article. It may well be that you get into Yandex again with the request “ how to archive a file ” or “ archiver ”. Where will these requests lead? Most likely to WinRAR or, less likely, to 7-Zip. Therefore, we turn to these archivers.
If you have WinRAR, then by default, you will create a rar-archive. If 7-Zip, then 7z. Both formats open both in WinZip, and in WinRAR, and in 7-Zip, therefore, in principle, the recipient will have no problems with unpacking. Another thing is that in the Russian segment, the default user account will not archive in zip.
Here the answers are also not very complicated: WinRAR is friendlier (compare GUI programs), archives faster by default, the name is heard.
Because he does not know what, he is afraid of the command line and files with a double extension.
This article is written to ensure that we: programmers, IT specialists, administrators - are more indulgent to a user who has his own problems and is much easier to download from a zip (or rar) site than to see a slightly more compressed tarball or 7- zip archive Thanks for attention.
PS I have a licensed WinRAR on my computer with the maximum zip backup by default.
PPS This is not a post love for WinRAR.
What's going on in the market?
First, let's remember what compression formats we know? Well, we list - ZIP, RAR, TAR, GZ, BZ2, 7ZIP, ACE, (L) HA, CAB, ZOO, LZH, ARJ ... Plus a few more “specific” image compression formats - IMG, ISO, MDF, NRG. Maybe you remember some more, but it's not about that. What does the ordinary ordinary user remember?
There are two answers to this question - the right one and, as it is easy to guess, the wrong one. Let's start with the second - an ordinary user will call zip, rar, ace and 7z. It is not difficult to check if you look at the number of downloads on, for example, cnews.ru to describe the situation on the Russian market and on download.com to view the global market. What do we see?
')
And we see literally the following - in the world 194 million WinZip downloads, 85 million WinRAR downloads, almost 4 million downloads - WinACE and about 2 million 7Zip. As it is easy to see, two-thirds of the market is controlled by WinZip (and this when considering work out of the box in Windows XP +), almost a third of WinRAR. In addition, do not forget that WinAce is already an abandoned project, which is losing its fans.
Now back to the Russian market. Here the situation is completely different. First, we do not have a centralized place to download files. Yes, yes, try to type in " soft " in Yandex, and you will see a link to Soft.mail.ru, yes Soft.CNews, described above. Sensible ratings are not there, but we will be content with what we have . As we have noticed, WinZip is missing on both sites - they simply don’t use it in Russia, because WinRAR (33 thousand downloads, sic! ) And 7Zip (22 thousand) are preferred. The rest of the software almost does not appear, Yandex confirms the situation .
It was the wrong answer to the question “which archiver does the user use?” Now the correct answer is: “he does not know what a data archiver is”. Also, he does not know what browser he uses. And the word processor for it is equivalent to the name “Word”, and the spreadsheet software is uniquely “Excel”.
Why is this so?
What computer is for the user? This is primarily a way to do your job - preferably quickly and less thinking about the problems that his (the user) does not concern. This, as I said above, the program in which he writes a report is a browser where he pokes on his favorite social network, this is a mailer, which is actually GMail or Exchange Express.
The last thing the user remembers is the archiver, what is (and is it worth) on his computer? Now imagine a spherical user in a vacuum to which something comes in the mail .zip, .rar, .gz, .bz2, .7z. There are several options here - in the case of a ZIP archive, the user will not even understand what happened and open it with the system’s tools, because ZIP has been working out of the box in Windows for quite some time. Pierces a couple of buttons and calm down.
Much more interesting is the situation if RAR comes to him. Turn off the brain and think about what you would do if you didn't know what it is? You would have correctly loaded Yandex (google? Turn off the brain even more!) And type something like " rar " or " than / how to open rar ". Where do you go? That's right, on win-rar.ru and put yourself WinRAR. Well, of course, if you are a regular user, you know how to install software :)
The situation becomes much worse if you (regular user) download .gz or .bz2. A simple search in Yandex by " bz2 " or " gz " will not give anything - the first lines lead to the "dense" Wikipedia. But the query “ how to open gz ” is quite nothing and will lead the user to softboard.ru, where the user will be sent for WinRAR. Or, perhaps, for 7-Zip.
Why is the Russian segment different from the global one?
There we figured out how users get WinRAR or 7-Zip. Now let's see what happened to WinZip from the Russian market segment. The answer lies on the surface - users do not know and / or do not want to use a program that does not speak their native language. WinRAR is Russified, it has a Russian site. 7-zip tries to keep up - 7-zip.org.ua/ru . You will say that WinZip also has a Russian-language page . Yes, this is true, but the user zip will open out of the box, he will not download the "unnecessary" program.
Why users do not archive in zip / gz?
Suppose you (an ordinary user) finally understood why data compression is needed and stopped bothering your acquaintances with multimeter letters. Let's figure out what and how you will archive.
If before you only had zip out of the box, then perhaps you will find the inconspicuous menu item “Send> Compressed Zip-folder” in the drop-down menu on the right-click menu. Did you know about this item? I specifically found it for this article. It may well be that you get into Yandex again with the request “ how to archive a file ” or “ archiver ”. Where will these requests lead? Most likely to WinRAR or, less likely, to 7-Zip. Therefore, we turn to these archivers.
If you have WinRAR, then by default, you will create a rar-archive. If 7-Zip, then 7z. Both formats open both in WinZip, and in WinRAR, and in 7-Zip, therefore, in principle, the recipient will have no problems with unpacking. Another thing is that in the Russian segment, the default user account will not archive in zip.
Why is WinRAR used more often 7-Zip?
Here the answers are also not very complicated: WinRAR is friendlier (compare GUI programs), archives faster by default, the name is heard.
Why won't the user archive in bz2 / gz?
Because he does not know what, he is afraid of the command line and files with a double extension.
How to live?
This article is written to ensure that we: programmers, IT specialists, administrators - are more indulgent to a user who has his own problems and is much easier to download from a zip (or rar) site than to see a slightly more compressed tarball or 7- zip archive Thanks for attention.
PS I have a licensed WinRAR on my computer with the maximum zip backup by default.
PPS This is not a post love for WinRAR.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/74023/
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