[type_r503]

I have a few questions about using compression on your apps for download. What size files need to be compressed, < 1M, > 1M, etc? What compression format is preferred, .sit, .zip, .gz, ...? Should compression be combined with a .dmg or just compress the folder? How may of you compress you apps for d/l?

Thanks for the insight,

type R

[NeXTLoop]

As far as size, there's really no limit on what size you should start compressing. Basically, the smaller the better. There's still enough people using dial-up that even a moderately "smal" file, such as <1MB, can still be a pain to download.

As for format, more and more .dmg is becoming the standard. The format has pretty impressive compressing capabilities as well.

Course, that's just my 2 cents.

[Rickster]

Legacy-style Carbon apps require resource forks, and Cocoa and new-style Carbon apps are a bundle of several files -- so if you're posting an app for download, the only way to get it to the user in a usable form is to archive it somehow. (No matter how big it is.)

Disk Copy images are becoming the most common way to distribute Mac OS X apps. There are a few tools to help you put together good DMG-based software distributions easily (such as FileStorm and DropDMG), but you can do it with Apple's built-in tools just as well.

Contrary to popular belief, you don't need to compress or otherwise archive a DMG file. Some think this is necessary in order to make a DMG download (instead of displaying as text) when you click it in a web browser. It's not -- you just need to configure your web server to send the right MIME type for .dmg files.

[Angus_D]

FileStorm is pretty spiffy.

What is the correct mime type for dmg btw?

[itai195]

Or you could just be lazy and compress your .dmg files as .sit and not have to worry about mime types.

[Synotic]

Originally posted by itai195:
Or you could just be lazy and compress your .dmg files as .sit and not have to worry about mime types.

Or you could save yourself a LOT less work (it adds up) and just configure it once and then throw away Stuffit. You'd also spare people from having to decompress a compressed DMG

[calumr]

Originally posted by Angus_D:
What is the correct mime type for dmg btw?

application/octet-stream apparently.

[Jeebs]

I seem to recall reading that the .sitx format is better for Mach-O bundles than the older .sit format, especially if compressed by older versions of StuffIt, because of the file structure and/or permission bits.

When compiling for Windows, that ".DS store" file always gets included when I zip a folder containing the app and read-me file. I wonder if an upgrade from StuffIt Deluxe 6 to the current version (9) would solve both of these problems. It'd be nice to do everything with one simple program, especially if the Zip files need to be created under Windows since they're intended for Windows users.

[ashtoash]

Or you could stop using .SIT or any stuffit product. Poorly coded, slow to uncompress, no real advantage. If your really lazy (for this way) right click on your .dmg and archive to .zip

Originally posted by itai195:
Or you could just be lazy and compress your .dmg files as .sit and not have to worry about mime types.

[Chuckit]

Originally posted by ashtoash:
Or you could stop using .SIT or any stuffit product. Poorly coded, slow to uncompress, no real advantage. If your really lazy (for this way) right click on your .dmg and archive to .zip

to both points.