Suggestion for change: Archive naming when multi-selection

Hi,

I'm trying to get rid of PowerArchiver as my main archive creation application, and use Dopus instead.
I've noticed they use different namings when multiple files in folder are selected. In my oppinion PowerArchiver naming is better and more logical - it uses parent folder name, while Dopus uses file/folder name on which user right-clicked (or first folder in case of a button click instead of shell right click).

Is there an option for this, and is it possible to implement it. It shouldn't be much work.
Thanks in advance.


Hey guys, any thoughts about this?
Thanks!

We'll reply once we've had a chance to look into it properly.

So if you right-click a single file PowerArchiver will want to compress it to an archive named after its parent folder? That doesn't seem all that logical to me.
Or does it only do it if you select ALL files in the folder or something?

No, if you right-click a single file it will name the archive with that file name.

I'm thinking about multiple files. It doesn't make sense to me (and dopus currently works that way) that you name it based on right-clicked file or folder. It's more logical to use parent folder name when archiving more than one file or folder.

Also it would make sense if multiple files are selected but they have same name (with different extension for example - like a movie with subtitles or something lik that) to use that filename instead of parent folder.

It sounds like the rules that govern it could get quite complex. I have a Downloads directory which is full of unrelated files, but if I selected one or two or even ten from there and right-clicked I wouldn't want the resulting archive to be named Downloads.zip.

Why would you zip anything in Downloads folder. You usualy zip something to send to someone. It is more often case to zip few related files than unrelated (project related).

But you don't have to remove current way of naming. Just add add two additional items in context menu (in my example) that would also give me an option to compress directly to folder name.

For example:
Add to "Inducta.Practices.7z"
Add to "Inducta.Practices.zip"

I'm also concerned about current DOpus zip files naming convention.
Many archiving applications, like WinRAR and said Power Archiver, use:

  1. selected file name if only one item is selected
  2. parent folder name if more than one item is selected.

About your downloads folder example: compressing files Opera.exe, DOpus.exe and Foobar.exe and naming it Opera.zip makes as little sense as downloads.zip, but I personally think that the latter is still better - all those files are downloads, but they are not Opera files so naming it Opera.zip may result in files getting lost. Anyway, what I usually do is compressing files that are eg. project-related, so naming them after project name (which is parent folder name) is more useful.

I'm not disputing that sometimes using the name of the parent folder makes sense, I'm just trying to point out that sometimes it doesn't, and there's no easy way for a computer program to know which case is better. Maybe having both names always available (or at least an option to show both names) is the solution.

Yes, both things would be the best, and probably the easiest thing for you to do.
Also it would be easier for user to pick the one he wants. That way you would be even better than other archivers since you will have 2 names instead of only one :slight_smile:

Will you think about implementing it? It is not top priority ofc, but it will make my life a bit easier since this is the only thing that keeps me from using the dopus as primary archiver tool (since I need to do manual renaming of the archive most of the time). That + different icons for every archive type - but this I can fix myself. And it is pity since you have done a great job with dopus archive support.

Thanks and best regards!

Of course, two options would be great, especially because one can customize menus and delete items that are not used (or add them if they are not default).

In the next version we'll make it so commands for both names are added to the context menu. We won't add an option to enable/disable this behaviour at this stage - if you have more than one file selected, it will just automatically include an additional command for "Add To .zip".

Great! That is perfect.
Thank you!