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How to Zip and Unzip
Your Files:
Compression Techniques to
Save Storage Space.
How to "Unzip" compressed files:
Install a file compression utility onto your computer, for example WinZip. This is especially important if you have an operating system other than Windows XP, which may not be configured to process compressed files on its own.
With WinZip installed, you can simply "double-click" any icon that links to a file in the filename.zip format. Also, you can open WinZip itself and use the WinZip Wizard to guide you through the process in a quick fashion.
Using the WinZip Wizard, you first select the "Unzip a file" option, then select whichever file it is you wish to decompress. Again, the file must be of the filename.zip type, i.e. - it must be a compressed file already, where filename is whatever the name of the compressed file is.
If you want to utilize some of the more advanced unzipping techniques, you can also use the WinZip Classic mode to decompress a "zipped" file. The Classic mode is able to break apart large files into several .zip ones, place encryption passwords on your compressed files, and much more. The Classic mode uses a graphical user interface that emulates the Windows operating system, so one can simply learn to treat the compression process as an extension of their computer's regular capabilities. You can use WinZip to decompress any zipped file you receive, usually they are sent over the Internet, because they take up less space and offer quicker download times.
How to "Zip" or Compress any file on your computer:
To "Zip" or compress a file, first open your computer's file compression utility, then select the file or files (more than one file can be compressed into a single .zip file) that you wish to compress and finally select the "Zip these files" option, and you will be prompted to give this newly compressed (Zipped) file a filename which can be the same or different from the filenames of the file(s) you have compressed.
You can also usually "right-click" on the icon of a file that you wish to compress or "Zip," and the resulting menu that pops up should (usually) include an option to send that file into a "compressed folder" (a .zip file). This allows you to bypass having to manually start up the file compression utility separately, as that will now be done automatically for you.
The Windows XP operating system has a built-in file compression utility (at least my version does), so there is no need to install an external compression utility program. Although you still certainly can do so if you want to, because often these extra programs offer features and capabilities that go much further beyond the simple (essentially just Zip and Unzip) tasks offered by the built-in compression utility.
File compression is desirable when there is a premium on available storage space for files. Also, if you want to send files to others over the Internet, it is often a good idea to compress those files first, so that they can be received more quickly, and those that do receive them do not have to compromise disk space if they do not have a whole lot to spare at that moment.
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