bzip2 is a free software/open source data compression algorithm and program developed by Julian Seward. Seward made the first public release of bzip2, version 0.15, in July 1996. The compressor's stability and popularity grew over the next several years, and Seward released version 1.0 in late 2000.

Compression efficiency

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bzip2 compresses most files more effectively than more traditional gzip or ZIP, but is slower. In this manner it is fairly similar to other recent-generation compression algorithms. Unlike other formats such as RAR or ZIP (and similar to gzip), bzip2 is only a data compressor, not an archiver. The program itself has no facilities for multiple files, encryption or archive-splitting, in the UNIX tradition instead relying on separate external utilities such as tar and GnuPG for these tasks.

In some cases, bzip2 is surpassed by 7z and RAR formats in terms of absolute compression efficiency. With the constant effect of Moore's Law making computer time less and less important, compression methods like these have become quite popular. According to the author, bzip2 gets within ten to fifteen percent of the "best" class of compression algorithms currently known (PPM), although it is roughly twice as fast at compression and six times faster at decompression.

More on [ Bzip2 ]

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