[Macpilot]

OK, this is probably a dumb question......BUT...

I don't really understand the advantage or use of the Finder option to "Archive" a folder. If I want to make a backup of something, why not just drag the folder to an external drive or burn a disk with it?

Why go through the process of Archiving it, and then dragging a .zip file to the backup media? I guess I am confused as to the usefullness of this feature.

[Developer]

"Archiving" in the Finder means compression. The ZIP archive is smaller than the uncompressed files, provided those files are not already in a compressing file format (like MPEG, JPEG, AAC, mp3 etc.)

It also means (if the ZIP file is created and decompressed by the Panther Finder) that long filenames, other meta-data and the files' resource forks are preserved in a way that survives being transfered via mail, or on CD or media formatted on other systems' file formats.

[Macpilot]

Dude, thanks.

I actually presumed that was the case. My Documents folder is at around 140 megs and it compressed it down to around 100 megs when I archived it. I guess if your external backup source is limited this would be usefull.

Thanks again.

[Terri]

It is very useful if you need to mail a folder of stuff to someone.

[philm]

'Archive' is a poor choice of term by Apple for this task. Whilst I appreciate that compression can be used as a meand of archiving, there are a number of other methods to archive also. It's non-intuitive. Someone just asked me today about compressing some files and I showed them this new featurein 10.3 - they had not seen it before. Everyone knows what 'compression' is with respect to computer files - Apple should have just called it that instead.

[Terri]

I agree, the name is confusing.

[tooki]

The name is simply tradition in the computer industry: when you save (compressed or not) multiple files into one file containing them all, the container is called an archive.

It harks back to the days when you archived stuff onto magnetic tapes for archival storage. Yikes. We young'uns don't really grasp how annoying tapes must have been. (I can't really imagine using tapes for everyday stuff.)

tooki

[msuper69]

Originally posted by tooki:
The name is simply tradition in the computer industry: when you save (compressed or not) multiple files into one file containing them all, the container is called an archive.

It harks back to the days when you archived stuff onto magnetic tapes for archival storage. Yikes. We young'uns don't really grasp how annoying tapes must have been. (I can't really imagine using tapes for everyday stuff.)

tooki

As one who used to be a computer operator back in the '70s (working in a big IBM mainframe shop), tapes were used not just for backup but for master and transaction files. Online was a foreign concept back then. But we NEVER called the backups an archive. Maybe they were called archives by other computer vendors but not in IBM shops.'

Tapes were very important for storing active files back then as hard disks were expensive and limited in capacity. An IBM 3330 hard drive stored about 100 mb. Our shop had probably 50 or so of these drives. Now every Mac has tons of storage compared to those dinosaurs. How the technology has advanced. Incredible.

I can remember carrying two armloads of tapes around while loading them up to run all the batch jobs every evening. Man that hurt when my arm would get pinched between two of the tapes.

[nobodybutme]

Originally posted by msuper69:
As one who used to be a computer operator back in the '70s (working in a big IBM mainframe shop), tapes were used not just for backup but for master and transaction files. Online was a foreign concept back then. But we NEVER called the backups an archive. Maybe they were called archives by other computer vendors but not in IBM shops.'
...

Well some current IBM shops use the term . Tooki had it right, but it's a little more than tradition. That's just what it's called. Just like a file is called a file. Hence, tar, Tape ARchive. Check Stuffit, Winzip, RAR, jar documentation, whatever. They refer to archives in the documentation. I guess it could be confusing if you're not familiar with any compression utilitites, but it's the name of that type of object.