zipping/unzipping -- progress report

[CJGIDMAN@xxxxxxxxxx]

     Here's what happened, starting from the very beginning...
     
     I downloaded a 2.5 megabyte .tar.gz file from the internet onto 
     my Windoze PC here at work.
     
     I then zipped the file using "PKZIP -&" to span across multiple 
     FAT floppies.
     
     After failing to unzip with gunzip or gzip -d, I went back to the 
     internet and download zip and unzip.  These fit on a single 
     floppy nicely so I loaded them onto my linux box.  The compiling 
     of unzip went smoothly.
     
     Then, I tried to unzip right off the floppy.  No dice.  Unzip 
     said that it couldn't find the signature at the end of the file.  
     The file is either corrupt or part of a multipart file which is 
     not supported in the current version.
     
     Thinking I could trick it, I put in the second part of the file 
     and tried to unzip it.  This time the error message said that it 
     was the last part of a multipart file and that I should put the 
     files together in order and unzip it.
     
     So, I cp'd the two files to my /tmp directory and cat'd them 
     together.  Unzip read the file, bitched and moaned a bit and then 
     produced a file that was just about the right size.  I guess I 
     should have taken Bruce's suggestion first.
     
     I renamed that file, and did a "tar -xvzf" on the file, but tar 
     complained and said something wasn't quite right.  For kicks,  I 
     tried gunzipping.  It worked.  Then, I untarred without the -z 
     option.  Boom!  Success.
     
     I have since successfully compiled the untarred files and 
     everything seems to be working just fine.
     
     Just thought you'd like to know.
     
     Chris.
     CJGidman@am.pnu.com
     
     
______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: Re[2]: zipping/unzipping
Author:  Bruce Smith <bruce@armintl.com> at INTERNET
Date:    1/30/98 09:24 AM


>      Yes, you are right. I'm downloading a 2.5MB file at work, zipping 
>      it with pkzip with disk spanning on.  I want to pull it right off 
>      the floppies onto the linux file system (my hard drive) in the
>      first decompression.  If that works, I'm home free.  (Literally) 
>      My home Linux PC is Linux only.
>
>      Progress report so far: gunzip (gzip -d) failed to recognize the 
>      file format.  This is because gzip and pkzip apparently have very 
>      little in common.  However, the man pages or other documentation 
>      I found said to get 'zip' and 'unzip' from oak.oakland.edu.
>      These are supposedly completely compatible with pkzip.  The unzip 
>      compressed file is small enough to fit on a single floppy, so I
>      shouldn't have any trouble uncompressing it with gunzip.  I'll 
>      let you know.  Any additional information, caveats, warnings, 
>      etc. would be received with much gladness.
     
Yes, pkzip and gzip are two completely different compression programs. 
"zip/unzip" are the Unix version of pkzip.
     
I'm not sure that unzip (unix) can do disk spanning.  If you find 
that it cannot, you could try coping each file on the diskettes to 
your hard drive, and combine them all with "cat".  Then try to unzip 
the combined file.  I've never tried this, but it's worth a shot.
     
i.e
for every diskette:
        mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/fd0
        cp /mnt/fd0/* .
        umount /mnt/fd0
     
Then you should have a bunch of files like:
        zipfile.001
        zipfile.002
        zipfile.003
        .
        .
     
Then you can "cat zipfile.* > combined.zip" to combine them all. 
Then try a "unzip combined.zip".
     
Good luck, and let me know how you make out.
     
-------------------------------------------- 
Bruce Smith                bruce@armintl.com 
System Administrator / Network Administrator 
Armstrong International, Inc.
Three Rivers, Michigan  49093  USA
--------------------------------------------