FreeArc

Free and open source file archiver

freearc

Developer(s)| Bulat Ziganshin
Final release|

0.666[1]  / 20 May 2010

Preview release|

0.67 alpha[2]  / 12 August 2012

Repository|

* sourceforge.net/projects/freearc

Written in| Haskell, C++, C
Operating system| Microsoft Windows, Linux
Platform| IA-32
Type| File archiver
License| GPL-2.0-only[3][4]
Website| freearc.org at the Wayback Machine (archived 2016-11-18)

FreeArc is a free and open-source high-performance file archiver developed by Bulat Ziganshin. The project is presumably discontinued, since no information has been released by the developers since 2016 and the official website is down.

A "FreeArc Next" version is under development, with version FA 0.11 released in October 2016.[5] The "Next" version supports 32- and 64-bit Windows and Linux and includes Zstandard support.[6]

## Algorithms

[edit]

FreeArc uses LZMA, prediction by partial matching, TrueAudio, Tornado and GRzip[7] algorithms with automatic switching by file type. Additionally, it uses filters to further improve compression, including REP (finds repetitions at separations up to 1gb), DICT (dictionary replacements for text), DELTA (improves compression of tables in binary data), BCJ (executables preproccesor) and LZP (removes repetitions in text).[8]

## Benchmarks

[edit]

### Archive size

[edit]

In 2010 Tom's Hardware benchmarks comparing it to the other popular archivers, FreeArc narrowly outperformed WinZip, 7-Zip, and WinRAR in its "best compression" mode. In the "default compression" tests, it lost to 7-Zip's LZMA2, but still compressed better than WinRAR and WinZip.[9]

### Speed

[edit]

In the same Tom's Hardware tests, FreeArc was outpaced at default settings by 7zip's LZMA2 default compression, and also by WinRAR, even at its best compression settings. FreeArc's compression at its best settings was slower than both 7zip and WinRAR, but still came ahead of WinZip.[9]

### Efficiency

[edit]

In a metric devised by Werner Bergmans of Maximum Compression Benchmark, FreeArc compression is more efficient than programs for classic formats like .Z (LZW), .zip (Deflate), .gz or bzip2. (The scoring formula used in this non-public test,

score X = time X × 2 10 ⋅ ( size X size TOP − 1 ) {\displaystyle {\text{score}}_{X}={\text{time}}_{X}\times 2^{10\cdot \left({\frac {{\text{size}}_{X}}{{\text{size}}_{\text{TOP}}}}-1\right)}}

multiplies the sum of compression and decompression times by a factor that exponentially grades the ratio of archive sizes achieved by the program under test relative to the best known archive size for that data set.) As of November 2010, FreeArc is the top program in this benchmark, followed by NanoZip, bsc and WinRAR. It works faster than WinRAR and 7zip.[10]

## Features

[edit]

freearc

Filename extension|

`.arc`

Internet media type|

`application/x-freearc`

Developed by| Bulat Ziganshin
Type of format| Data compression

Like RAR and ZIP it is an archiver, not just a data compressor like gzip or bzip2. Initially it supported only its own archive format, normally identified by the `.arc` file name extension, incompatible with others;[8] there is no relationship with other .arc formats. More recently,[when?] decompression support for other archive types was added, including zip, rar, and 7z. FreeArc has both a command line interface and a GUI.[10] Other features include:

* Solid compression with "smart updates" which avoid recompression when possible
* AES/Blowfish/Twofish/Serpent encryption,[8] including chaining of encryption algorithms
* FAR and Total Commander plug-ins
* Ability to create self-extracting archives and installers
* Archive protection and recovery layer using Reed–Solomon error correction with user-defined size (for example, recovery over Internet being 0.1%, while default is autosize 1-4%).

## Supported platforms

[edit]

Windows binaries are available from the developer. There is no 64-bit variant of version 0.666,[11] but FA 0.11 supported both 32- and 64-bit systems.[5]

## FreeArc Next

[edit]

In October 2016 the first public release of FreeArc Next was released.[5][12] It is currently available only as a CLI application for 32 and 64 bit Windows and Linux platforms. New features include:

* Full-archive deduplication similar to ZPAQ
* Support for the Zstandard compression algorithm
* Lua programming for the INI file
* Better files prefetching which increases compression speeds

## See also

[edit]

* Free and open-source software portal

* List of archive formats
* List of file archivers
* Comparison of file archivers
* List of Unix commands
* rzip
* lzma

## References

[edit]

1. ^ "Freearc news".
2. ^ "Freearc Changelog".
3. ^ "FreeArc news". 2009-12-21. Archived from the original on 2016-11-22. "Finally, we have added License file clearly stating that FreeArc is free for any usage."
4. ^ "FreeArc : Develop". Retrieved 2009-08-17. "license: GPL"
5. ^ a b c "FreeArc 'Next". encode.su. Archived from the original on 2020-04-15. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
6. ^ "FA 0.11 release notes". GitHub. Retrieved 2024-09-18.
7. ^ "grzip - Freecode". sourceforge.net. Retrieved 9 July 2021.
8. ^ a b c Patrick Schmid, Achim Roos, (March 10, 2010) 7-Zip 9.1 Beta And FreeArc 0.60, Tom's Hardware
9. ^ a b "Proprietary Formats: Compression Rate, Size, And Duration - Four Compression And Archiving Solutions Compared". 10 March 2010. Retrieved 25 June 2016.
10. ^ a b "FreeArc - Kompressionsprogramm mit eigenem Format" (in German)., golem.de
11. ^ "FreeArc Download page". Archived from the original on 2012-01-18. Retrieved 2012-01-07.
12. ^ "Bulat-Ziganshin/FA". GitHub. Retrieved 2016-10-15.

## External links

[edit]

* freearc.org at the Wayback Machine (archived February 17, 2017)
* FreeArc on SourceForge (abandoned)
* Binary files and source code of version 0.67

* v
* t
* e

Archive formats

Archiving only|

* ar
* cpio
* shar
* tar
* LBR
* WAD
* WARC

Compressing only|

* Brotli
* bzip2
* compress
* gzip
* Zopfli
* LZMA
* LZ4
* lzip
* lzop
* SQ
* xz
* Zstandard

Archiving
and compressing|

* 7z
* ACE
* ARC
* ARJ
* B1
* Cabinet
* cfs
* cpt
* dar
* DGCA
* .dmg
* .egg
* kgb
* LHA
* lrzip
* LZX
* MPQ
* PEA
* RAR
* rzip
* sit
* sitx
* SQX
* UDA
* Xar
* zoo
* ZIP
* ZPAQ

Software packaging
and distributing|

* apk
* App
* APPX
* deb
* HAP
* ipa
* JAR
* WAR
* Jakarta EE RAR
* EAR
* MSI
* MSIX
* Package (macOS)
* RPM
* XAP
* XBAP

Document packaging
and distributing|

* OEB Package Format
* OEBPS Container Format
* Open Packaging Conventions
* PAQ

* Comparison
* List
* Category

* v
* t
* e

Data compression software

Archivers with
compression
(comparison)|

| Free and
open-source|

* 7-Zip
* Ark
* Expander
* FreeArc
* GNOME Archive Manager
* Info-ZIP
* KGB Archiver
* PAQ
* pax
* PeaZip
* XAD (decompression only)
* Xarchiver
* Zipeg
* ZPAQ

|

Freeware|

* Filzip
* LHA
* Lhasa (decompression only)
* StuffIt Expander (decompression only)
* The Unarchiver (decompression only)
* TUGZip
* ZipGenius

Commercial|

* ARC
* ALZip
* Archive Utility
* ARJ
* BetterZip
* MacBinary
* PKZIP/SecureZIP
* PowerArchiver
* StuffIt
* WinAce
* WinRAR
* WinZip

Non-archiving
compressors|

| Generic|

* bzip2
* compress
* gzip
* lzip
* lzop
* pack
* rzip
* Snappy
* XZ Utils
* zstd

|

For code|

UPX

Audio
compression
(comparison)|

| Lossy|

* AAC
* Fraunhofer FDK AAC
* Nero AAC Codec
* FAAC
* Helix DNA Producer
* MP3
* l3enc
* LAME
* TooLAME
* libavcodec
* libcelt
* libopus
* libspeex
* Musepack
* libvorbis
* Windows Media Encoder

|

Lossless|

* ALAC
* FLAC
* libavcodec
* Monkey's Audio
* mp4als
* OptimFROG
* Shorten
* WavPack

Video
compression
(comparison)|

| Lossy|

| MPEG-4 ASP|

* 3ivx
* DivX
* Nero Digital
* FFmpeg
* HDX4
* Xvid

|

H.264|

* CoreAVC
* Blu-code
* DivX
* FFmpeg
* Nero Digital
* OpenH264
* QuickTime
* x264

HEVC|

* DivX
* x265

Others|

* CineForm
* Cinepak
* Daala
* DNxHD
* Helix DNA Producer
* Indeo
* libavcodec
* Schrödinger (Dirac)
* SBC
* Sorenson
* VP7
* libtheora
* libvpx
* Windows Media Encoder

Lossless|

* FFV1
* Huffyuv
* Lagarith
* MSU Lossless
* YULS

* See also: compression methods and compression formats

* v
* t
* e

Free and open-source software

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| Types and
standards|

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* Definition of Free Cultural Works
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* The Free Software Definition
* The Open Source Definition
* Open-source license
* Permissive software license
* Public domain

|

Challenges|

* Digital rights management
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* Mozilla software rebranding
* Proprietary device drivers
* Proprietary firmware
* Proprietary software
* SCO/Linux controversies
* Software patents
* Software security
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Related
topics|

* Forking
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* Open-source hardware
* Shared Source Initiative
* Source-available software
* The Cathedral and the Bazaar
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