WinRAR was and still in fantastic software if you're working on Windows. I know there are CLI tools for macOS, FreeBSD, and Linux but in terms of guaranteed compatibility and being understood by users zip will always be my go-to format. It's like comparing AAC to MP3: the former is superior quality at a smaller size but I have to explain to some people (too many, really) how to play an AAC file while MP3 just works for everyone.
WinRAR is heavily entrenched in the PC space since the early Warez/DC++/BitTorrent days when storage and internet bandwidth was scarce so media was split in smaller files compressed as tightly as possible, preferably self extracting as well.
So any pirated content you'd download 20+ years ago was almost guaranteed to be RAR archived. Or sometimes even WinACE [1], anyone remember that one? It was awesome as well. Seems like the early 2000's was a war of compression formats similar to VHS vs Betamax decades earlier.
If you go on older established torrent trackers you can still find original torrents/content archived in RAR or ACE formats. Like Disney's Hercules for example.
It's because since RAR is proprietary and didn't have a corporation friendly way to look inside those archives, so they couldn't be scanned.
For users, it was not an issue since they don't have to worry about licensing and whatnot.
WinRAR was also a fun target to write your very own crack for it. You could crack it multiple ways a well: remove the dialog and change texts, patch it to think it's licensed or write a keygen.
It's my understanding that RAR has some kind of built in data recovery like PAR and I believe had better encryption support early on. IIRC traditional zip encryption was kind of a joke, maybe it was neutered to comply with the export restrictions from the 90s.
Spanning is old as dirt, I remember doing it with pkzip and floppies so I don't think it is something unique to RAR.
On other hand WinRAR handles running software inside archive much better. So if you only need to run some portable tool one or two time it is pretty handy as there is no need to extract it.
There's a facebook group for people to announce they paid for WinRAR because of the no one pays for it meme. Can't remember what it was called.
I paid for winrar I think 15 years ago when I started working full time and it was the first shareware app I paid for. I don't use it as much as I used to nowadays.
Surprised it's still being updated. I thought the creator of WinRAR passed away.
> I also paid for the BOSCH drill I use, my 4K monitor, ergonomic chair and other such work tools, so why not pay for SW tools as well?
None of these are a useful comparison, since they're physical objects which cannot be infinitely copied, so the reasons to pay for them do not necessary apply to software.
> Why NOT pay for software you use?
Each person probably has a different answer, and the same person might have different answers in different situations. In my case, nearly all of the software I use is free software, which is offered free of charge (and any payment I make is actually a donation to the developer, not paying for the software).
When putting together a large RAR file that's been split into smaller files, one can use PAR and PAR2 files to repair and replace damaged or missing segments.
I think most other formats/software support things like splitting, "healing" archives and self-extracting archives by now, so the only reason I could think of is getting the "premium support" where you can quickly reach a human to help you with whatever problem you have. That might be more important for larger companies rather than individuals.
If you have an tar with compression and you only need one file in the middle it will takes times.
Same problem exists with every compression like bzip2 that can compress only one file and requires an tar for multi file.
Back in the day you would hope for rar/par if you were downloading something big, like a program you couldn't afford but needed to try, I'll leave it at that.
And back in win98 and maybe xp days WinRar was a great way to escape file system access restriction imposed by the admin, you could use its internal browser to do access just about anything on the machine, even tough explorer and many other windows components wouldn't :)
> You have sent too many requests in a given amount of time.
Edit:
Once it did download, the installer says that it can't create some files because they're "being used by another process", except I don't have winrar running. Ugh.
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So any pirated content you'd download 20+ years ago was almost guaranteed to be RAR archived. Or sometimes even WinACE [1], anyone remember that one? It was awesome as well. Seems like the early 2000's was a war of compression formats similar to VHS vs Betamax decades earlier.
If you go on older established torrent trackers you can still find original torrents/content archived in RAR or ACE formats. Like Disney's Hercules for example.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinAce
For users, it was not an issue since they don't have to worry about licensing and whatnot.
WinRAR was also a fun target to write your very own crack for it. You could crack it multiple ways a well: remove the dialog and change texts, patch it to think it's licensed or write a keygen.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parchive
Spanning is old as dirt, I remember doing it with pkzip and floppies so I don't think it is something unique to RAR.
If you encrypt ZIP file - then filenames aren't encrypted, only content.
I paid for winrar I think 15 years ago when I started working full time and it was the first shareware app I paid for. I don't use it as much as I used to nowadays.
Surprised it's still being updated. I thought the creator of WinRAR passed away.
Especially if it's a useful tool and developed by a small team(one guy?) instead of an evil multi-trillion tax-dodging conglomerate.
I also paid for the BOSCH drill I use, my 4K monitor, ergonomic chair and other such work tools, so why not pay for SW tools as well?
None of these are a useful comparison, since they're physical objects which cannot be infinitely copied, so the reasons to pay for them do not necessary apply to software.
> Why NOT pay for software you use?
Each person probably has a different answer, and the same person might have different answers in different situations. In my case, nearly all of the software I use is free software, which is offered free of charge (and any payment I make is actually a donation to the developer, not paying for the software).
[Not] paying for winrar was a meme. Hence my post. I buy everything I use.
Download:
> 429 Too Many Requests
> You have sent too many requests in a given amount of time.
Edit:
Once it did download, the installer says that it can't create some files because they're "being used by another process", except I don't have winrar running. Ugh.
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