ZipStream is an innovative Disk Compression System for OS/2 versions 2.1,
2.11 and OS/2 Warp, from Carbon Based Software.

ZipStream is an OS/2 Installable File System (IFS) that mirrors access to
existing OS/2 File Systems, simultaneously providing automatic transparent
file compression and decompression. ZipStream differs from other OS/2 Disk
Compression Systems in that compression is done on a per-file rather than
per-sector basis - rather than provide a new filing system that resides in
a container file on an existing partition, each file that is selected for
compression is simply stored as a compressed file on the existing
partition, and transparently decompressed on demand. This partition may be
of any other valid OS/2 File System type, including FAT, HPFS, CDFS and
LAN.

This method has a number of advantages; re-use of the existing OS/2 File
System code leads to:

 - Greater speed efficiency, since existing caching mechanisms are
   leveraged, and no reformatting is required.
 - Smaller code size
 - Increased reliability and safety, since no direct disk accesses are
   made, and existing OS/2 File System tools (e.g. CHKDSK, HPFSTOOL,
   SpeedDisk) may be used for recovery and maintenance.

The benefits of file-based compression are

- Increased safety: since each file is processed individually, any failure
of the compression system will be limited to one file, unlike a container
file system where the whole container is endangered when failures occur.

- Ultra high compression ratios: Compression may be optimised on the basis
of entire file type and contents, as opposed to single sectors. This
yields compression comparable to popular archiving packages, e.g. PKZIP.

- Non-boot resistance: if the system is damaged so severely that the
transparent decompression engine does not function, the file system is
still visible. Compressed files may be manually decompressed using the
command-line ZSUNPACK utility, and the OS repaired using conventional
methods with full access to undamaged files.

ZipStream is a fully 32-bit Native application, designed specifically for
OS/2, and making full use of OS/2's multithreading and memory management
systems.

The unregistered version of ZipStream v1.03f is now available from

  ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/os2/diskutil/zs103f.zip
  ftp://ftp.demon.co.uk/pub/os2/diskutil/zs103f.zip
  ftp://leo.org/pub/os2/drivers/ifs/zs103f.zip
  Lib 1 of OS2BVEN in CompuServe
  Lib 4 of OS2USER in CompuServe
  IBM OS/2 BBS Australia (+61 2 889 8311)

Registration is $89.95 for the fully packaged product, or $79.95 for
electronic registration only (prices in Australian dollars) from

Carbon Based Software             Fax: [61] 75 29 1544
PO Box 912
Runaway Bay, Qld. 4126
Australia.

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