2.1.2 compression options

specifying compression.

intermix-type option (-p).

This is the “specify compression for input files” option.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• must not appear in combination with any of the following options: vanilla-operation.

Allow positional parameter options. The compression method and encoding method options may be intermixed with file names. Files named after these options will be processed in the specified way.

compactor option (-C).

This is the “specify compaction (compression) program” option. This option takes an argument string PROGRAM.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• may appear an unlimited number of times.
• must not appear in combination with any of the following options: vanilla-operation.

The gzip, bzip2 and compress compactor commands may be specified by the program name as the option name, e.g. --gzip. Those options, however, are being deprecated. There is also the xz compactor now. Specify xz with -C xz or --compactor=xz.

Specifying the compactor "‘none’" will then disable file compression, even for non-text files. Any other compactor will force uuencoding of files, and the recipient must have uudecode to unpack the archive. (Compressed files are never processed as plain text.)

Specifying the compactor compress is deprecated.

level-of-compression option (-g).

This is the “pass level for compression” option. This option takes an argument number LEVEL. Some compression programs allow for a level of compression. The default is 9, but this option allows you to specify something else. This value is used by gzip, bzip2 and xz, but not compress.

bzip2 option (-j).

This is the “bzip2 and uuencode files” option.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• may appear an unlimited number of times.

bzip2 compress and uuencode all files prior to packing. The recipient must have uudecode bzip2 in order to unpack.

NOTE: THIS OPTION IS DEPRECATED

gzip option (-z).

This is the “gzip and uuencode files” option.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• may appear an unlimited number of times.

gzip compress and uuencode all files prior to packing. The recipient must have uudecode and gzip in order to unpack.

NOTE: THIS OPTION IS DEPRECATED

compress option (-Z).

This is the “compress and uuencode files” option.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• may appear an unlimited number of times.
• must be compiled in by defining HAVE_COMPRESS during the compilation.

compress and uuencode all files prior to packing. The recipient must have uudecode and compress in order to unpack.

NOTE: THIS OPTION IS DEPRECATED

level-for-gzip option.

This is an alias for the level-of-compression option, see the level-of-compression option documentation.

bits-per-code option (-b).

This is the “pass bits (default 12) to compress” option. This option takes an argument string BITS.

This option has some usage constraints. It:

• must be compiled in by defining HAVE_COMPRESS during the compilation.

This is the compression factor used by the compress program.

NOTE: THIS OPTION IS DEPRECATED