Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!ukc!warwick!bsrdp
From: bsrdp@warwick.ac.uk (Hylton Boothroyd)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: PKZIP and ZOO - why PKZIP disappointed me today
Summary: The emperor is missing some clothes
Keywords: PKZIP ZOO
Message-ID: <465@clover.warwick.ac.uk>
Date: 29 Mar 90 18:55:05 GMT
Organization: Warwick Business School
Lines: 33

As a happy user of ZOO (c.b.i.p and all that) I have been hoping never
to have to bother with PKZIP. True, the appearance of ZIP's in the
SIMTEL archives have forced me into the use of a UNIX unzip on the
central Unix network that links me to the outside world - it's at that
level that I repack archives into ZOO's, complete with comments, before
downloading.

I like my header comment. I prepare it in an editor and when I have got
it just right
        zoo cA my.zoo < header
adds it quickly and painlessly. It contains a note of where the archive
came from and up to 15 lines of nicely-formatted condensed comment
about main features, commands, and relevance to present and future
needs.  So a
        zoo Vf my.zoo
gives me an informative report, with several file names per line at the
bottom of the screen as with a unix `ls' command.

But the first few SIMTEL ZIPs repacked as ZOOs were so much bigger than
the ZIP originals that I thought I'd better see what PKZIP could do. I
unpacked it last night for a day's exploration today.  Lovely manual.

But what a disappointment today has been! No chance of a decently laid
out header - at best just one long string of information ...
... except perhaps if I entered ANSI escape codes...
But no, every time I add an ASCII-27 to try to start an ANSI escape
sequence everything I have typed vanishes and I have to start again.

And when I list the files, "brief" turns out to be almost as much as
normal, there's no way of avoiding one-set-of-file-info-per-line. I
can't bear it!  Screeeeaaaaaaammmmmmmmmmmm!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hylton