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Dact

compress or expand a file or stream

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Daniel Pérez
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12 views3 pages

Dact

compress or expand a file or stream

Uploaded by

Daniel Pérez
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as TXT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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DACT(1)

General Commands Manual


DACT(1)

NAME
dact - compress or expand a file or stream

SYNOPSIS
dact [ -dsfcvlniCHOShVNa ] [-b size] [-e algo] [-m file] [-o file] [-u url]
[-p url] [-M command] [-D desc] [-I algo] [-U file] [-E cipher] [file ...]

DESCRIPTION
DACT reduces input files by attempting to compress each block of the file
with several different algorithms and selects the best one for each block.

OPTIONS
-d Decompress the file (or stdin, if no file is given), removing the
extension if it has a valid one.

-s Display statistics about the file, such as: Magic number of file,
DACT version file was compressed with, Block size used to compress file, Compressed
file size, Original file's size, Compres‐
sion ratio (uncompressed to compressed), File's original name, CRCs
(if available).

-f Force bad and unsafe things to happen. Can be combined to make even
worse things happen. One `-f' allows overwriting of existing files, two `-f'
allows you to ignore bad magic and CRC check
fails.

-c Send output to stdout, this will allow you to force DACT to send
compressed output to a terminal or result of compressing a file to a pipe.

-v Increase verbosity, can be combined to increase verbosity a lot.


Currently, only up to 3 makes sense. One `-v' displays a bar graph. Two `-v'
displays a bar graph and block information.
Three `-v' displays a bar graph and detailed compression statistics
per block.

-l List compression algorithms available.

-n Toggle use of CRCs. This option is especially useful when combined


with the network capabilities of DACT. It allows you to create a compressed file
with only the header pointing to a web
page that contains the real DACT file (which normally has its CRCs
checked against the compressed header to ensure they're the same file), with this
option the files do not have to be from
the same source (i.e., you can have an updated copy automatically
extend itself.)

-i Read input from standard input instead of /dev/tty. This is used to


read user supplied information like encryption keys and passwords from standard
input instead of the more appropriate
method of opening "/dev/tty."

-C Complain when compression errors occur. When a block is selected,


it is tested to ensure that it decompresses back to the original source. If it
fails, the algorithm is not used, with this
option you are informed of the failure.
-H Write only header (no data). This option is useful for distributing
archives that need only reside on the internet someplace.

-O Toggle writing original file name in the DACT header. This has no
real use that I know of.

-S Use speed-size as a metric rather than size. This is not implemented


yet. This will make DACT create an optimized compressed file, balancing speed of
decompression with size.

-h Give usage synopsis.

-V Display DACT version.

-N Upgrade DACT. This option will fetch the latest binary from the
internet and place it in $HOME/.dact/ as dact.bin. If you have `binary_check on'
in your dact.conf file, DACT will check for
this file and use it. If you have Debian and run `dact -N' as root
the Debian upgrade procedure will upgrade your entire system.

-a DACT modules. This option will fetch the latest modules from the
internet and place them in $HOME/.dact/ in a subdirectory corresponding to your
Operating System and CPU Architecture.

-b size
Use the specified block size to compress the file. The size
parameters is in bytes.

-e num Exclude an algorithm from being used. This option is useful if you
know your target will not be able to decompress a certain algorithm (you can get
their numbers from the `-l' option.)

-m file
Load another config file. This option will attempt to load the
specified file in addition to the normal files, the options in this file will
supersede other options.

-o file
Alternate output. This option sends output to a file instead of
INFILE.dct. The file can also be a URL or '-' for standard out.

-u url This option will encode an URL in the compressed file's header, this
URL will be tried (and CRCs checked) before attempting to decompress the data in
the actual file.

-p url URLs in DACT can have variables in them that will be expanded when
network access is required, this allows you to test the results of that
extrapolation easily. Variables and their values
are:
@@OSNM@@ OS Name (linux, freebsd, sunos, etc)
@@OSVR@@ OS version (2.2.x, 4.2, 5.8, etc)
@@OSVS@@ OS version (short) (2.2, 4.2, 5.8, etc)
@@ARCH@@ Arch (i386, sparc64, sun4u, sun4m, etc)
@@DIST@@ If OSNM=Linux, distribution of Linux.
@@FILE@@ Name of compressed file.
@@DTVR@@ Version of DACT (maj.min.rev)
@@DTVS@@ Version of DACT (short) (maj.min)
@@PASS@@ Prompt for Password
@@USER@@ Prompt for Username
@@ATSN@@ Put an `@'
example:
dact -p http://www.rkeene.org/devel/dact/precompiled/dact-
@@OSNM@@-@@OSVS@@-@@ARCH@@.bin
dact: http://www.rkeene.org/devel/dact/precompiled/dact-linux-
2.4-i586.bin

-M command
This option executes a command from the command line as if it
appeared in "dact.conf".

-D desc
Encode the description specified into the header of the compressed
file.

-I num Use only 1 algorithm (and uncompressed as a fall-back), useful if you


want to limit yourself to a certain type of compression.

-U file
Encode the specified file into the header of the compressed file.
This file will be searched (line-by-line) for a working URL to download compressed
content from. See also `-u.'

-E cipher
Enable encryption using the specified algorithm, different algorithms
use different authentication methods.

FILES
$HOME/.dact/
$HOME/.dact/dact.conf
/etc/dact.conf

SEE ALSO
gzip(1), bzip2(1), mcrypt(3)

AUTHOR
Roy Keene <[email protected]>

DACT(1)

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