Only ZIP files allowed?

sp00n · 02-02-12, 12:29 PM

Why have the allowed file types changed to only support ZIP files now?
Before you could also upload RAR files, and now it is restricted to only ZIP files for whatever reason.

ZIP is exceptionally bad for archives with lots and lots of files, for example my Muted Sounds Addon, which countains roughly 50,000 files. Changing from RAR to ZIP, its file size jumps from ~5MB to ~80MB, even if I choose the highest compression available.
Which in turn of course puts me way over the file size limit of this page, which is 40MB.

Thus, my only chance are to either rename the RAR file into .zip (which I have done now, but expect little success, as it's still pending), pack the RAR file into another ZIP file (with similar expectations) or simply stop using WoWInterface.

Isn't there any chance that you allow RAR files again?

***Dolby*** · 02-02-12, 12:48 PM

The main reason why is because pecl rar for php has been abandoned so our scripts to check files no longer work since we've upgraded to php5.3x. There are also some bad licensing issues with rar.

However you have brought up an issue I didnt think of yet so I've re-enabled the ability to upload rar. I dont want users to have to rename extensions as thats extremely confusing. I have put your file on hold and if you could please re-upload as .rar I'll make sure it gets approved. Rar files though will take a little longer to approve since they will have to be manually extracted and checked instead of an admin using our tool to peak inside the archive.

I have also gone and updated the size limit to 100mb since we can now handle the extra bandwidth no problem with our CDN. I could even go higher if shown its needed.

Sorry for the trouble.

SDPhantom · 02-02-12, 02:01 PM

Similarly, would it be possible to support .7z? It's an open source format so I doubt licensing would be an issue. Last I checked, PHP doesn't support it, so it'll have to be manually scanned too. Details are on the 7-zip website.

***Cairenn*** · 02-02-12, 02:13 PM

The ability to peek inside the file is only one of the reasons why we switched back to our old policy. Another big one is because the majority of users out there are using Windows and a .zip extractor comes standard with Windows. They don't have to go find a .rar extractor to install. On that same note, the majority of users get a .rar file and have no idea what it is or how to deal with it. They understand .zip files though. They would be completely lost if they saw a .7zip or .tar extension!

Phanx · 02-03-12, 03:12 AM

@sp00n:

Since users already have to do something by hand to install your "addon" (eg. they can't let an updater program handle it for them) couldn't you just include one copy of the sound file in your addon, along with a batch file (*.bat file) that copied it out into all the appropriate places?

This would also negate the need for different versions of your package; you could simply include different batch files, and users could run the ones they wanted to remove different sound categories.

Most likely, the WoWI staff would have to manually approve each upload, since they'd want to look at your batch file and make sure it wasn't doing anything malicious. If users were concerned, they could simply do the same, and open it in Notepad and see exactly what it was doing.

sp00n · 02-03-12, 07:48 AM

@Phanx
I've actually thought about that, but contrary to you I just assume people would go crazy about OMGKEYLOGGEREXECTUABLEFILE!!!11 if I included a script, even if it would only run through a list of files and copy the .wav and .ogg files to the relevant places.
I mean, if the expectations here are that most people don't even know how to use a .rar file, do you really think they'll know how to check a batch file for malicious content?

@Dolby
Thanks, I appreciate your help.

And at last, some statistics, just for the fun of it.
There are 48,879 files and 1,306 folders. Only two types of files exist, and all files of each type share the same content (the files have a size of 3,946 bytes resp. 44 bytes).

Filesize with WinZip (.zip): 85,136 kb
Filesize with WinRAR (.rar): 4,954 kb
Filesize with 7-zip (.7z): 282 kb

I really do like 7-zip, but unfortunately it's just too uncommon (yet?).

SDPhantom · 02-03-12, 02:33 PM

I use 7-zip all the time and they brag to have the best .zip compression too. I use .7z for my personal archives and .zip for anything public utilizing their program.

Nibelheim · 02-03-12, 03:00 PM

Originally Posted by sp00n

I really do like 7-zip, but unfortunately it's just too uncommon (yet?).

7-zip is pretty freakin' sweet. It's free and open-source as well. It's fast, has greater compression, handles zip, rar, tar, wim, 7z, etc.

Talyrius · 02-03-12, 07:21 PM

I heard that Microsoft may add native RAR support in Windows 8 along with VHD/ISO mounting.

7-Zip is definitely nice, but its much less commonly used. However, I use it all the time.

Vlad · 02-03-12, 08:04 PM

7z is one of my favorites, shame it can't create archives of every format that it can open up, that would be extremely sweet. :3

haste · 02-04-12, 04:15 AM

Originally Posted by sp00n

And at last, some statistics, just for the fun of it.
There are 48,879 files and 1,306 folders. Only two types of files exist, and all files of each type share the same content (the files have a size of 3,946 bytes resp. 44 bytes).

Filesize with WinZip (.zip): 85,136 kb
Filesize with WinRAR (.rar): 4,954 kb
Filesize with 7-zip (.7z): 282 kb

Does the built-in Windows zip functionality handle LZMA zips? I know the zip container (and WinZip) does. Both zip and 7z are container formats and they both support a variety of different compression schemes. 7z uses a modified LZMA algorithm by default, while zip uses DEFLATE I believe.

SDPhantom · 02-04-12, 04:35 AM

Originally Posted by haste

Does the built-in Windows zip functionality handle LZMA zips? I know the zip container (and WinZip) does. Both zip and 7z are container formats and they both support a variety of different compression schemes. 7z uses a modified LZMA algorithm by default, while zip uses DEFLATE I believe.

Well, the story is 7-zip used LZMA, which is an enhanced version of the same algorithm DEFLATE uses, LZ77 I think. Now they're using a new version, LZMA2.

Zyonin · 02-07-12, 02:44 AM

Originally Posted by haste

Does the built-in Windows zip functionality handle LZMA zips? I know the zip container (and WinZip) does. Both zip and 7z are container formats and they both support a variety of different compression schemes. 7z uses a modified LZMA algorithm by default, while zip uses DEFLATE I believe.

Last I checked (some time ago), the built in Windows zip utility was quite basic and did not handle LZMA compression. It's basically an old version of WinZip that was added to handle basic zip/unzip functions. WinZip has since developed it further.