
There is only one valid use for zip: getting around stupid web servers that either don’t allow dmgs (*shakes fist at GeoCities*) or that don’t have a proper media type (application/octet-stream) set for it.

#Stuffit expander os 9 software#
Distributing Mac software does not count. Your application might work (unless you actually did intend to use the resource fork for something, in which case it’s gone then), but littering a user’s system is not a way to build goodwill.įourth, the purpose of Finder’s zip support is to allow you to send files to Windows users. Specifically, it will create ugly ‘_MACOSX’ folders. Third, if somebody on Jaguar (or earlier) downloads your zip file, and you created it using Finder, it will not unpack correctly in StuffIt Expander. listed above is particularly egregious - hello, Mr. Be very surprised if the additional savings exceed 20 K. ‘Correctly’ means making a read-only compressed image, either from a folder or from another (read/write) image. Second, if you created your dmg correctly, it is already compressed (probably with zlib). tar files exist to put multiple files into one file. All of these features are the wrong way to distribute an application.įirst off, tarring a dmg is pointless. Tiger added support in the Finder for gunzipping, bunzip2ing, and un tarring files. Panther added support in the Finder for zipping and unzipping files. If you are still distributing your software in StuffIt format, you are to blame. In fact, it isn’t the cause of the problem at all. Doesn’t that make a great first user impression? And who’s going to suspect that their unarchiver is the cause of the problem? So if you UnStuff an application from a StuffIt 5 archive, it might not even run. sit is the older StuffIt 5 format, that doesn’t properly support application packages! Worse: because StuffIt 5 format does not support storage of UNIX permissions, StuffIt Expander relies on a preference setting to know whether to set a file as executable or not.
#Stuffit expander os 9 mac os x#
Regarding the last one: StuffIt format? WHY?!?!?! Mac OS X doesn’t even come with StuffIt Expander anymore!Īnd it’s not even StuffIt X (that would be. sit, as these are absurdly common), nor am I critiquing the quality of the software these are just examples of how not to distribute your application. I’m not singling any of these products out (especially for. Here’s a brief hall of shame, in increasing order of silliness:

The sad current state of affairs is that much software is not distributed in a plain dmg.
