SparkFS
| SparkFS | |
| Icon: | [[Image:|left|]] |
|---|---|
| Maintained by: | {{{maintainer}}} |
| Description: | SparkFS is a powerful compression filing system that saves disc space and allows you to use compressed files and programs as easily as uncompressed ones. |
| OS Restrictions: | None |
| Languages: | {{{languages}}} |
| Alternatives: | ArcFs |
| Website: | http://pilling.users.netlink.co.uk/spark.html |
Compression Filing Systems
Because SparkFS is a full-blown filing system, it makes archive files as easy to access as ordinary directories. To a non-technical user, the only differences are in the access speed (see below), the shape of the 'directory' icon and the fact that files within an archive cannot be renamed. By comparison, compression programs such as Squash, Spark, InfoZip and PKZip for DOS do not allow direct access to the contents of a compressed file. The archive must first be decompressed, usually to another location on the hard disk, and thereafter the standard filer tools can be used with it. After any changes have been made, recompressing is a separate stage.
Speed
The speed of accessing compressed files varies from that of normal uncompressed files. While compressing and decompressing files always carries a slight processing overhead, if the archive is stored on a slow storage medium, such as a floppy disk, dealing with compressed files may still actually be faster because of their smaller size. However, adding or removing large numbers of files from an archive is likely to be much slower using a program like SparkFS, because it is a necessary technical requirement for all filing systems that the files or directories being managed retain their integrity after each and every file is added or deleted. Because they do not need to ensure that the archive is valid at every stage of the updating process, programs like Spark or InfoZip can apply all the modifications in one go and perform the bookkeeping functions afterwards, and when a lot of files must be added to or deleted from an archive, these programs become much quicker by comparison.
