LhASFX User's Guide Evaluation Version 1.0 - 22 November 1991 ### ### ##### ##### ##### ## ## ## ## ### ## ### ## ### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ##### ####### ##### #### #### ## ## ## ## ## ### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ####### ### ### ## ### ##### ## ## ## Written by Stefan Boberg Copyright (c) 1991 by Stefan Boberg V1.0 LhASFX User's Guide Page 1 0 - LhA LhASFX is part of the LhA family of programs. The same rules applies to this program as LhA - read the `politics' section of the manual for more information. When you register yourself as a user of LhA, you automatically register as a user of LhASFX as well, and will receive updates at the same time as LhA updates. 1 - Introduction LhASFX sole purpose in life is to create SFX-archives. A SFX-archive is a normal LhA archive with a special executable SFX-header prepended to it, which makes it possible to list, test and extract files from the archive by means of executing it. Those of you who have used LHA or ARJ on MSDOS machines probably know what it is. It was written primarily to provide me with a good way of distributing my LhA package on BBS'es, FidoNet and other computer networks. I think it is rather silly to distribute an archiver in an archive-file, since you then will need another archiver, which may also be archived and so on.. I've even seen examples where the archiver was distributed in an archive created by itself! :) There are other similar programs for the Amiga, but none as fast, flexible and efficient as LhASFX. The other programs use compression methods that have a much smaller compression ratio than that of LhASFX, and use their own archive file format. LhASFX uses the standard LhArc/LhA archive format, and LhASFX archives can easily be converted to standard LhArc/LhA archives with a simple command ('UnSFX', part of the LhA package), or manipulated with the LhA archiving program directly. Another advantage LhASFX has compared to other archivers is that LhASFX handles archives of any size in only 48K of RAM. While other programs load the entire archive into memory at once, LhASFX loads the data when it needs it. 2 - System requirements The LhASFX program will run on any Amiga system with at least 512KB RAM and one diskdrive. The SFX-Module only uses about 48K memory when decompressing or listing archives, regardless of archive size. The decompression routines of the SFX-module are less optimized than those of the real archiver LhA, because I consider size as being more important than speed in this case (it still is fast, anyway!). V1.0 LhASFX User's Guide Page 2 3 - How to use it Using the LhASFX program to create SFX archives is simple, the command line syntax is as follows: LhASFX [] Where is the name of the archive you wish to convert, with or without the `.lha' or `.lzh' extension. The optional is the name of the file you would like to hold the SFX archive. If no is specified, LhASFX takes the basename of (i.e. strips any extensions) and appends a `.run' suffix to it to indicate that it is an executable SFX file. If you specify a without the `.run' extension LhASFX will put one there. DO NOT DISTRIBUTE LhASFX ARCHIVES WITH ANY OTHER SUFFIX THAN `.RUN' PLEASE!! 4 - Limitations of the SFX module The SFX module only handles the -lh5- and -lh4- compression modes, and of course stored files (-lh0-). It does *NOT* handle the old -lh1- compression mode. If you want to make a SFX-archive of an archive which uses the -lh1- compression, simply use the LhA `c' command to convert to `-lh5-' compression, or repack the normal way (unpack somewhere and then pack it again with the -2 switch). The SFX module does NOT handle multiple-volume archives. This is the evaluation version of LhASFX, and it does not contain all features that the `real' version registered LhA users get. The `real' LhASFX contains some more switches, and the SFX module is smaller. The registered version also contains an advanced integrity check algorithm that is VERY difficult to bypass. V1.0 LhASFX User's Guide Page 3 5 Politics For disclaimers, licensing information etc., please refer to the user's manual for the LhA archiver. Table Of Contents LhASFX V1.0 0 - LhA ................................................ 1 1 - Introduction ....................................... 1 2 - System requirements ................................. 1 3 - How to use it ......................................... 1 4 - Limitations of the SFX module .......................... 2 5 Politics ............................................ 3 - I -