Quick Question: Zipped File Won't Open

[mrlynn]

A friend has a Numbers spreadsheet that he says somehow got Zipped. Double-clicking on it just creates another Zipped copy. What's wrong?

He tried Stuffit Expander; says "it doesn't work."

???

/Mr Lynn

[D-Rod]

Maybe it didn't get zipped but the file code changed. Change it back to the one Numbers uses and try opening it.

[silvarios]

I've seen something like that before. Believe I used this and everything worked properly. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-unar...4353?mt=12

Could be a file extension snafu, but I've definitely experienced the inability to open up a zip file on a Mac, with the resulting weird behavior mentioned by the OP.

[Forrest]

He tried Stuffit Expander; says "it doesn't work."

Wow - haven't used that program in many years. How old is the computer he's using? OSX has been able to unzip files natively since 2005 (10.4) - maybe earlier.

[silvarios]

Forrest wrote:

He tried Stuffit Expander; says "it doesn't work."

Wow - haven't used that program in many years. How old is the computer he's using? OSX has been able to unzip files natively since 2005 (10.4) - maybe earlier.

You didn't see my post, eh? I had enough trouble with the built in unzip service in 10.6/10.7 I ended up with an app as well.

[Onamuji]

It's either not really a zip file or it's corrupt. It's weird, but the Archive Utility will compress any file that it can't unzip.

My guess is that the original file was simply renamed. Go back to the original zip file and rename it to end in ".numbers" instead of ".zip" and see if the file will open in numbers.

[silvarios]

Onamuji wrote:
It's either not really a zip file or it's corrupt. It's weird, but the Archive Utility will compress any file that it can't unzip.

My guess is that the original file was simply renamed. Go back to the original zip file and rename it to end in ".numbers" instead of ".zip" and see if the file will open in numbers.

Excepting, every file I've unzipped with this problem has worked fine and we are dealing with ROM images so it actually would be pretty noticeable if the zip was corrupted. There's something weird with some zip files, I think it depends on the software used to create the zip. I do agree this could be a simple manner of a renamed file.

[Onamuji]

silvarios wrote: There's something weird with some zip files, I think it depends on the software used to create the zip.

Well, yeah. It could be a 7zip file or suchlike. But usually those apps will use a variation on .zip instead of just naming the files as if they were legit .zip files. Anyway, same diff as to behavior - the Archive Utility will end up compressing those files if it can't decompress them.