> On 5/15/07, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> I'm interested in merging some earlier archival work (in C) into commons >> compress and would like to know who to coordinate with. The changes >> will >> be... substantial... and I'll probably just fork the project for now, >> with >> a goal of merging in late summer. > > It's a dormant component at the moment (we need to move it over to > dormant I think). I don't know of anyone who is monitoring it - Chris > Grobmeier was the last one who was discussing working on it (or am I > forgetting someone more recently?)
Hmmm... dormant.... Seriously, that creates a lot of flexibility. The cool thing about archives is that you can think about them as persistent Maps if you're willing to be see a "filename" as potentially an arbitrary string key instead of just a concrete presentation of a concrete file on your hard disk. That insight makes you look at archive files in a whole new light, as something potentially occupying a space between a properties file and a full JDBC connection. Something that can even be nested, e.g., the .deb package format is nothing more than a couple compressed tar files inside of a unix 'ar' library/archive. You can't do that if you only see archives as boring things used in backups. Backups that are either windows (zip) or unix (tar), yawn. If you go hardcore, you'll notice that a lot of common file formats provide support for arbitrary data to be buried within the files. JPEG and PNG image formats, ELF executable files and shared libraries.... This definitely isn't 1.0 stuff, but it's something to keep in mind. --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
