File Compression Explained

What is file compression?

Compression works by eliminating or minimizing redundancy in a file, making your files smaller without losing any information. Every character on your computer, every letter, digit and punctuation mark, is actually made up of several characters that make up computer code. A simple example of compression is: If you have a set of characters "AAAADDDDDDD" representing a letter, one type of compression software can rewrite this as "4A7D", saving seven spaces and making that line 64% smaller. Compression software uses algorithms to do this.

What is an archive?

Think of an archive as the container that holds your compressed files. An archive can contain a single file or many files, which can be in many folders inside the archive. Each archive is a single document, just like a word processing document, graphics file or database.

StuffIt vs. Zip Compression

StuffIt equals compression.

Aladdin Systems is the developer of the StuffIt file format (.sit) as well as the publisher of the StuffIt product line. Compression is at the heart of the StuffIt brand, and the StuffIt line of products creates both StuffIt (.sit) and zip (.zip) archives to provide you with greater flexibility when distributing, or backing up your files.

StuffIt archives are typically smaller than zip-compressed files, making StuffIt the format of choice when file size matters. The more data you compress, the more StuffIt technology will pay off, compressing most large files up to 20% smaller than zip. StuffIt can compress your files up to 98% of their original size, so they fly across the Internet or networks faster, and arrive at their destinations sooner. And, you can get more data onto your hard drive or removable media such as Zip disks, CDs, or floppies. When smaller is better, use StuffIt.

With StuffIt, you'll not only create and send the smallest archives, but you'll ensure that the integrity of your data is intact and readable to the recipient. The StuffIt file format (.sit) protects file attribute information for both PC and Mac files, and because it's Unicode compliant, files that are named with non-roman and 2-byte characters will be successfully preserved when you expand them. Your data is important, so why trust it with any other compression utility? Just StuffIt.

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