zlib

How are zlib, gzip and zip related? What do they have in common and how are they different?

Short form: .zip is an archive format using, usually, the Deflate compression method. The .gz gzip format is for single files, also using the Deflate compression method. Often gzip is used in combination with tar to make a compressed archive format, .tar.gz. The zlib library provides Deflate compression and decompression code for use by zip, … Read more

How can I decompress a gzip stream with zlib?

To decompress a gzip format file with zlib, call inflateInit2 with the windowBits parameter as 16+MAX_WBITS, like this: inflateInit2(&stream, 16+MAX_WBITS); If you don’t do this, zlib will complain about a bad stream format. By default, zlib creates streams with a zlib header, and on inflate does not recognise the different gzip header unless you tell … Read more