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PLZIP(1) User Commands PLZIP(1) NAME plzip - reduces the size of files SYNOPSIS plzip [options] [files] DESCRIPTION Plzip is a massively parallel (multithreaded) implementation of lzip. Plzip uses the compression library lzlib. Lzip is a lossless data compressor with a user interface similar to the one of gzip or bzip2. Lzip uses a simplified form of LZMA (Lem- pel-Ziv-Markov chain-Algorithm) and is designed to achieve complete in- teroperability between implementations. The maximum dictionary size is 512 MiB so that any lzip file can be decompressed on 32-bit machines. Lzip provides accurate and robust 3-factor integrity checking. 'lzip -0' compresses about as fast as gzip, while 'lzip -9' compresses most files more than bzip2. Decompression speed is intermediate between gzip and bzip2. Lzip provides better data recovery capabilities than gzip and bzip2. Lzip has been designed, written, and tested with great care to replace gzip and bzip2 as general-purpose compressed format for Unix-like systems. Plzip can compress/decompress large files on multiprocessor machines much faster than lzip, at the cost of a slightly reduced compression ratio (0.4 to 2 percent larger compressed files). Note that the number of usable threads is limited by file size; on files larger than a few GB plzip can use hundreds of processors, but on files smaller than 1 MiB plzip is no faster than lzip (not even at compression level -0). The number of threads defaults to the number of processors. OPTIONS -h display usage help and exit --help display full help and exit -V, --version output version information and exit -a, --trailing-error exit with error status if trailing data -B, --data-size=<bytes> set size of input data blocks [2x8=16 MiB] -c, --stdout write to standard output, keep input files -d, --decompress decompress, test compressed file integrity -f, --force overwrite existing output files -F, --recompress force re-compression of compressed files -k, --keep keep (don't delete) input files -l, --list print (un)compressed file sizes -m, --match-length=<bytes> set match length limit in bytes [36] -n, --threads=<n> set number of (de)compression threads [2] -o, --output=<file> write to <file>, keep input files -q, --quiet suppress all messages -s, --dictionary-size=<bytes> set dictionary size limit in bytes [8 MiB] -t, --test test compressed file integrity -v, --verbose be verbose (a 2nd -v gives more) -0 .. -9 set compression level [default 6] --loose-trailing allow trailing data seeming corrupt header --in-slots=<n> number of 1 MiB input packets buffered [4] --out-slots=<n> number of 1 MiB output packets buffered [64] --check-lib compare version of lzlib.h with liblz.{a,so} If no file names are given, or if a file is '-', plzip compresses or decompresses from standard input to standard output. Numbers may con- tain underscore separators between groups of digits and may be followed by a SI or binary multiplier: 1_234_567kB, 4KiB. Dictionary sizes 12 to 29 are interpreted as powers of two, meaning 2^12 to 2^29 bytes. The bidimensional parameter space of LZMA can't be mapped to a linear scale optimal for all files. If your files are large, very repetitive, etc, you may need to use the options --dictionary-size and --match-length directly to achieve optimal performance. To extract all the files from archive 'foo.tar.lz', use the commands 'tar -xf foo.tar.lz' or 'plzip -cd foo.tar.lz | tar -xf -'. EXIT STATUS 0 for a normal exit, 1 for environmental problems (file not found, in- valid command-line options, I/O errors, etc), 2 to indicate a corrupt or invalid input file, 3 for an internal consistency error (e.g., bug) which caused plzip to panic. REPORTING BUGS Report bugs to lzip-bug@nongnu.org Plzip home page: http://www.nongnu.org/lzip/plzip.html COPYRIGHT Copyright (C) 2009 Laszlo Ersek. Copyright (C) 2026 Antonio Diaz Diaz. License GPLv2+: GNU GPL version 2 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html> This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Using lzlib 1.16 Using LZ_API_VERSION = 1016 SEE ALSO The full documentation for plzip is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If the info and plzip programs are properly installed at your site, the command info plzip should give you access to the complete manual. plzip 1.13 March 2026 PLZIP(1)
NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | EXIT STATUS | REPORTING BUGS | COPYRIGHT | SEE ALSO
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