1UNZIPSFX(1L) UNZIPSFX(1L)
2
6 unzipsfx - self-extracting stub for prepending to ZIP archives
7
9 <name of unzipsfx+archive combo> [-cfptuz[ajnoqsCLV$]] [file(s) ...
10 [-x xfile(s) ...]]
11
13 unzipsfx is a modified version of unzip(1L) designed to be prepended to
14 existing ZIP archives in order to form self-extracting archives.
15 Instead of taking its first non-flag argument to be the zipfile(s) to
16 be extracted, unzipsfx seeks itself under the name by which it was
17 invoked and tests or extracts the contents of the appended archive.
18 Because the executable stub adds bulk to the archive (the whole purpose
19 of which is to be as small as possible), a number of the less-vital
20 capabilities in regular unzip have been removed. Among these are the
21 usage (or help) screen, the listing and diagnostic functions (-l and
22 -v), the ability to decompress older compression formats (the
23 ``reduce,'' ``shrink'' and ``implode'' methods). The ability to
24 extract to a directory other than the current one can be selected as a
25 compile-time option, which is now enabled by default since UnZipSFX
26 version 5.5. Similarly, decryption is supported as a compile-time
27 option but should be avoided unless the attached archive contains
28 encrypted files. Starting with release 5.5, another compile-time option
29 adds a simple ``run command after extraction'' feature. This feature
30 is currently incompatible with the ``extract to different directory''
31 feature and remains disabled by default.
32 Note that self-extracting archives made with unzipsfx are no more (or
34 less) portable across different operating systems than is the unzip
35 executable itself. In general a self-extracting archive made on a par‐
36 ticular Unix system, for example, will only self-extract under the same
37 flavor of Unix. Regular unzip may still be used to extract the embed‐
38 ded archive as with any normal zipfile, although it will generate a
39 harmless warning about extra bytes at the beginning of the zipfile.
40 Despite this, however, the self-extracting archive is technically not a
41 valid ZIP archive, and PKUNZIP may be unable to test or extract it.
42 This limitation is due to the simplistic manner in which the archive is
43 created; the internal directory structure is not updated to reflect the
44 extra bytes prepended to the original zipfile.
45
47 [file(s)]
48 An optional list of archive members to be processed. Regular
49 expressions (wildcards) similar to those in Unix egrep(1) may be
50 used to match multiple members. These wildcards may contain:
51 * matches a sequence of 0 or more characters
53 ? matches exactly 1 character
55 [...] matches any single character found inside the brackets;
57 ranges are specified by a beginning character, a hyphen,
58 and an ending character. If an exclamation point or a
59 caret (`!' or `^') follows the left bracket, then the
60 range of characters within the brackets is complemented
61 (that is, anything except the characters inside the
62 brackets is considered a match).
63 (Be sure to quote any character that might otherwise be inter‐
65 preted or modified by the operating system, particularly under
66 Unix and VMS.)
67 [-x xfile(s)]
69 An optional list of archive members to be excluded from process‐
70 ing. Since wildcard characters match directory separators
71 (`/'), this option may be used to exclude any files that are in
72 subdirectories. For example, ``foosfx *.[ch] -x */*'' would
73 extract all C source files in the main directory, but none in
74 any subdirectories. Without the -x option, all C source files
75 in all directories within the zipfile would be extracted.
76 If unzipsfx is compiled with SFX_EXDIR defined, the following option is
78 also enabled:
79 [-d exdir]
81 An optional directory to which to extract files. By default,
82 all files and subdirectories are recreated in the current direc‐
83 tory; the -d option allows extraction in an arbitrary directory
84 (always assuming one has permission to write to the directory).
85 The option and directory may be concatenated without any white
86 space between them, but note that this may cause normal shell
87 behavior to be suppressed. In particular, ``-d ~'' (tilde) is
88 expanded by Unix C shells into the name of the user's home
89 directory, but ``-d~'' is treated as a literal subdirectory
90 ``~'' of the current directory.
91
93 unzipsfx supports the following unzip(1L) options: -c and -p (extract
94 to standard output/screen), -f and -u (freshen and update existing
95 files upon extraction), -t (test archive) and -z (print archive com‐
96 ment). All normal listing options (-l, -v and -Z) have been removed,
97 but the testing option (-t) may be used as a ``poor man's'' listing.
98 Alternatively, those creating self-extracting archives may wish to
99 include a short listing in the zipfile comment.
100 See unzip(1L) for a more complete description of these options.
102
104 unzipsfx currently supports all unzip(1L) modifiers: -a (convert text
105 files), -n (never overwrite), -o (overwrite without prompting), -q
106 (operate quietly), -C (match names case-insensitively), -L (convert
107 uppercase-OS names to lowercase), -j (junk paths) and -V (retain ver‐
108 sion numbers); plus the following operating-system specific options:
109 -X (restore VMS owner/protection info), -s (convert spaces in filenames
110 to underscores [DOS, OS/2, NT]) and -$ (restore volume label [DOS,
111 OS/2, NT, Amiga]).
112 (Support for regular ASCII text-conversion may be removed in future
114 versions, since it is simple enough for the archive's creator to ensure
115 that text files have the appropriate format for the local OS. EBCDIC
116 conversion will of course continue to be supported since the zipfile
117 format implies ASCII storage of text files.)
118 See unzip(1L) for a more complete description of these modifiers.
120
122 unzipsfx uses the same environment variables as unzip(1L) does,
123 although this is likely to be an issue only for the person creating and
124 testing the self-extracting archive. See unzip(1L) for details.
125
127 Decryption is supported exactly as in unzip(1L); that is, interactively
128 with a non-echoing prompt for the password(s). See unzip(1L) for
129 details. Once again, note that if the archive has no encrypted files
130 there is no reason to use a version of unzipsfx with decryption sup‐
131 port; that only adds to the size of the archive.
132
134 When unzipsfx was compiled with CHEAP_SFX_AUTORUN defined, a simple
135 ``command autorun'' feature is supported. You may enter a command into
136 the Zip archive comment, using the following format:
137 $AUTORUN$>[command line string]
139 When unzipsfx recognizes the ``$AUTORUN$>'' token at the beginning of
141 the Zip archive comment, the remainder of the first line of the comment
142 (until the first newline character) is passed as a shell command to the
143 operating system using the C rtl ``system'' function. Before executing
144 the command, unzipsfx displays the command on the console and prompts
145 the user for confirmation. When the user has switched off prompting by
146 specifying the -q option, autorun commands are never executed.
147 In case the archive comment contains additional lines of text, the
149 remainder of the archive comment following the first line is displayed
150 normally, unless quiet operation was requested by supplying a -q
151 option.
152
154 To create a self-extracting archive letters from a regular zipfile let‐
155 ters.zip and change the new archive's permissions to be world-exe‐
156 cutable under Unix:
157 cat unzipsfx letters.zip > letters
159 chmod 755 letters
160 zip -A letters
161 To create the same archive under MS-DOS, OS/2 or NT (note the use of
163 the /b [binary] option to the copy command):
164 copy /b unzipsfx.exe+letters.zip letters.exe
166 zip -A letters.exe
167 Under VMS:
169 copy unzipsfx.exe,letters.zip letters.exe
171 letters == "$currentdisk:[currentdir]letters.exe"
172 zip -A letters.exe
173 (The VMS append command may also be used. The second command installs
175 the new program as a ``foreign command'' capable of taking arguments.
176 The third line assumes that Zip is already installed as a foreign com‐
177 mand.) Under AmigaDOS:
178 MakeSFX letters letters.zip UnZipSFX
180 (MakeSFX is included with the UnZip source distribution and with Amiga
182 binary distributions. ``zip -A'' doesn't work on Amiga self-extracting
183 archives.) To test (or list) the newly created self-extracting ar‐
184 chive:
185 letters -t
187 To test letters quietly, printing only a summary message indicating
189 whether the archive is OK or not:
190 letters -tqq
192 To extract the complete contents into the current directory, recreating
194 all files and subdirectories as necessary:
195 letters
197 To extract all *.txt files (in Unix quote the `*'):
199 letters *.txt
201 To extract everything except the *.txt files:
203 letters -x *.txt
205 To extract only the README file to standard output (the screen):
207 letters -c README
209 To print only the zipfile comment:
211 letters -z
213
215 The principle and fundamental limitation of unzipsfx is that it is not
216 portable across architectures or operating systems, and therefore nei‐
217 ther are the resulting archives. For some architectures there is lim‐
218 ited portability, however (e.g., between some flavors of Intel-based
219 Unix).
220 Another problem with the current implementation is that any archive
222 with ``junk'' prepended to the beginning technically is no longer a
223 zipfile (unless zip(1) is used to adjust the zipfile offsets appropri‐
224 ately, as noted above). unzip(1) takes note of the prepended bytes and
225 ignores them since some file-transfer protocols, notably MacBinary, are
226 also known to prepend junk. But PKWARE's archiver suite may not be
227 able to deal with the modified archive unless its offsets have been
228 adjusted.
229 unzipsfx has no knowledge of the user's PATH, so in general an archive
231 must either be in the current directory when it is invoked, or else a
232 full or relative path must be given. If a user attempts to extract the
233 archive from a directory in the PATH other than the current one,
234 unzipsfx will print a warning to the effect, ``can't find myself.''
235 This is always true under Unix and may be true in some cases under MS-
236 DOS, depending on the compiler used (Microsoft C fully qualifies the
237 program name, but other compilers may not). Under OS/2 and NT there
238 are operating-system calls available that provide the full path name,
239 so the archive may be invoked from anywhere in the user's path. The
240 situation is not known for AmigaDOS, Atari TOS, MacOS, etc.
241 As noted above, a number of the normal unzip(1L) functions have been
243 removed in order to make unzipsfx smaller: usage and diagnostic info,
244 listing functions and extraction to other directories. Also, only
245 stored and deflated files are supported. The latter limitation is
246 mainly relevant to those who create SFX archives, however.
247 VMS users must know how to set up self-extracting archives as foreign
249 commands in order to use any of unzipsfx's options. This is not neces‐
250 sary for simple extraction, but the command to do so then becomes,
251 e.g., ``run letters'' (to continue the examples given above).
252 unzipsfx on the Amiga requires the use of a special program, MakeSFX,
254 in order to create working self-extracting archives; simple concatena‐
255 tion does not work. (For technically oriented users, the attached ar‐
256 chive is defined as a ``debug hunk.'') There may be compatibility
257 problems between the ROM levels of older Amigas and newer ones.
258 All current bugs in unzip(1L) exist in unzipsfx as well.
260
262 unzipsfx's exit status (error level) is identical to that of unzip(1L);
263 see the corresponding man page.
264
266 funzip(1L), unzip(1L), zip(1L), zipcloak(1L), zipgrep(1L), zipinfo(1L),
267 zipnote(1L), zipsplit(1L)
268
270 The Info-ZIP home page is currently at
271 http://www.info-zip.org/pub/infozip/
272 or
273 ftp://ftp.info-zip.org/pub/infozip/ .
274
276 Greg Roelofs was responsible for the basic modifications to UnZip nec‐
277 essary to create UnZipSFX. See unzip(1L) for the current list of Zip-
278 Bugs authors, or the file CONTRIBS in the UnZip source distribution for
279 the full list of Info-ZIP contributors.
280Info-ZIP 20 April 2009 (v6.0) UNZIPSFX(1L)