ECN Forum Forums Technical Discussion Re: Computers and the Internet How does winzip work?

Hi, it's me again with my scanner!!!
I've just went to the next step in the download of the "s14d_enx.exe" file from "canon.com", thanks to "CN_HK" who helped me, but another problem appeared!!!
The following message subtitled "winzip self-extractor[s14d_enx.exe]"came. It said:
"To unzip all files in s14d_enx.exe to C:\WINDOWS\TEMP, press the unzip button"
But when I clicked on the unzip button, another message came which said:"19 files unzipped successfully", and that's it, no progress any more.

I would suggest that you point this to a dedicated directory before you unzip but once it is there you could sort the target by date and your files should be on top.
I use Winrar and it defaults to a sub directory it creates for each unzipped file.
The file extension "EXE" tells me this is really a self extracting file, making an unzipper unneccessary. Just put the "exe" in it's own directory and click on it.

That's correct, it's unzipped the contained files to that folder. If you now go to c:\windows\temp you should find the 19 files. However, you may have difficulty distinguishing which files they are. To get round this, run the s14d_enx.exe file again, then type in the dialog box to change the folder from c:\windows\temp to c:\windows\temp\newfolder, you should see 'newfolder' appear in the temp folder. If you now open this, you should find the files in there, there will probably be a readme file or setup file.

Edit: Oops, I realized I just basically stated a different way of doing what gfretwell already said. Either method will work fine

On a side note, why do drivers often seem to come in self extracting .exes? A simple .zip extension would in my opinion be better as it allows the user to choose where to put the (frequently temporary) files, instead of randomly choosing a location. (at least in this case they chose the temp directory, better than using c:\temp which frequently doesn't exist). And I wholeheartedly agree about winrar, a much better program for the purpose in my opinion.

[This message has been edited by chipmunk (edited 08-02-2005).]

They use self extractors because older windoze levels do not have a bundled zip extractor. I assume XP does. Still on 98 here.

I think I've seen XP handle ZIP files with its built-in utilitites, but I'm not certain (I don't use XP either).

The ZIP format has added different compression algorithms over the years, but the format itself has been around since before Windows came on the scene.

Hi guys, I've followed the instructions that you gave me and managed to install my scanner, thanks alot!!!