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Tips For ZipsYou've already mastered the basic premise of downloading -- great! Now you're ready to move on and learn all about how to download the big, juicy files -- the zip files! While browsing around the Web, you will undoubtedly find text, graphics, audio and video files that you'd like to download and utilize. Often these files are very large, and if left in their original form, they can take hours and hours and hours to download. There is nothing even slightly fun or exciting about sitting in front of your computer for hours to wait for a download to complete, unless you happen to enjoy watching a bar graph slowly inch its way across your screen. Therefore, to speed things up, most large files are compressed, or zipped. A compressed file can zip (sorry) through the download process in a fraction of the time of a regular file. You may have already encountered files while you were surfing the Web that were in the zip format. These files are clearly recognized by their .zip file extension, for example "bradpitt.zip." So how do you download these specially formatted files? It's really simple, and the chances are very good that you already possess the software program necessary to unzip the zipped files. Click on the "Start" Button at the bottom left hand corner of your screen, and then point to "Programs." Do you see a program called, "WinZip?" If so, you're in great shape. If not, you'll need to download the WinZip program. Go to http://www.winzip.com/ddchomea.htm. You can download a free unregistered version for a trial run. (You may elect to place the WinZip program in the "Programs" folder). OK. You've now got WinZip installed and are ready to go. Now what? Let's download a zip file! Pretend you are browsing the Web, and come across a large graphic that you would like to download. The directions say, "CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD." Do that. (Since we used Internet Explorer in our last download tutorial, I'm using Netscape this time. The process is the same, but the displays are slightly different.) You will see one of the following two windows:
or
Just like last time, you need to tell your computer where you'd like to keep this file that you are getting ready to download from the remote computer to your own. Therefore click on "Save File," or "Save it to disk." If you're using Internet Explorer, you'll need to click "Save this program to disk," and then "OK." Now it's time to choose the specific folder where you'd like to save your download. Again, this decision is entirely up to you -- but I recommend putting all downloads into a folder called "Downloads," so that there is no question about where to find it. You can always move it to a less generic place later. So, with that in mind, here's what you'll see next:
Up at the "Save In" box, find your "Downloads" folder by clicking the little triangle, selecting your hard drive letter (usually C:), and then double-clicking on your "Downloads" folder. In the "File name" box you'll need to name your download, and then click on "Save." At this point your computer will begin to transfer the file from the remote computer to the folder that you just specified. For purposes of this example, a very small file was used and so was transferred almost instantly, but larger files will take much longer. (But not nearly as long as an unzipped file!) So ... here we are again -- now what? You got it -- let's go find that zip file! Luckily for us we put it in our Downloads folder where we can find it right away. To get there, go back to your Desktop (the opening screen with all the little pictures (Icons) that represent your software programs), click on "My Computer," and then select your hard drive. Again, in most cases this will be your (C:) drive. See the Downloads folder? Double-click on it.
See that funky looking icon with the vise and our file name? Guess what -- that's the zip file we just downloaded! Now it's time to unzip it so you can look at it. Click on aboutzip. Wow! What's this colorful display all about? Remember that we need an unzipping program so that we can decompress these types of files? Welcome to WinZip!
All that's left to do now is to unzip that file that we downloaded. Is this difficult? Not unless you find that clicking on the file is tough going! Click! Bravo! Great going -- you just successfully downloaded and unzipped a zip file! You're now fully checked out in the downloading department and ready to take on any download that you desire. Programs, games, animated cartoons -- the Web is your oyster! A few notes: Although I personally recommend the WinZip program as my Zip Utility of choice, there are several other programs that you may want to explore once you get more comfortable with the compression/decompression process. Then again, you may not. :-) Make sure that you officially register any evaluation software, including WinZip, that you download when your trial run expires. And finally, take some time to get to know the potential of WinZip. Not only can you unzip files; you can zip files, as well, which comes in handy when you're emailing all those vacation photos to your friends! |
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