Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!mips!pacbell.com!decwrl!netcomsv!mrs
From: mrs@netcom.COM (Morgan Schweers)
Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Subject: Re: PKLITE, what's the catch???
Message-ID: <1991Jun29.052850.2121@netcom.COM>
Date: 29 Jun 91 05:28:50 GMT
References: <1991Jun26.012138.13729@mlb.semi.harris.com> <11230005@hplsla.HP.COM>
Organization: McAfee Associates
Lines: 31

Greetings,
    The SCAN and NETSCAN programs will scan inside of LZEXE'd and PKLITE'd
programs, and we may be supporting Diet in the future.  (Not sure about
that one yet.)  If a virus has been compressed, it will be detected.

    Another thing to look at (between LZEXE and the rest of them) is that
LZEXE is truly freeware.  If you wish to commercially distribute software
that has been LZEXE'ed, you can.  You cannot do this with either PKLITE,
or AXE.  I don't know the status of all the others, but the LZEXE fits
best with the GNU concept.  *grin*  (Guess which I use?)

    (As a side note:  AXE was the first, originally by SEA.  It didn't
fly very well, and it's compression was abysmal.  It was also commercial
(as befits SEA, of course.)  LZEXE came next, and was written by
Fabrice Bellard of France.  It's not updated much anymore but it is
the freest of all the packages.  PKLite is a good compressor, but
really wins in the area of being able to decompress exactly the file
you compressed.  It also wins because it's able to handle internal
overlays better.  It, however, costs.  I haven't used DIET, or any of
the others mentioned by frisk.)

    I imagine there will be wars over this, like there have been over
the various compression programs.  Suffice to say, it depends on where
your priorities lay.

                                                --  Morgan Schweers
-- 
mrs@netcom.com   |   Morgan Schweers   |  Good code, good food, good sex.  Is
ms@gnu.ai.mit.edu|   These messages    |  anything else important?  --  Freela
Kilroy Balore    |   are not the       +--------------------------------------
Freela           |   opinion of anyone.|  I *AM* an AI.  I'm not real...