JohnDas FunDas & Ideas

 What are CBR, CBZ, CBT, RAR, ZIP and TAR files?

Computer files are generally compressed into archive data sets to save space and to organize information better. Common archives are RAR, ZIP and TAR. Comics have a “special” set of extensions to designate them as “comics”. CBR, CBZ and TAR files are comic archive files. A CBR file is the same as an RAR file, CBZ the same as a ZIP file, and CBT the same as a TAR file. The designations allow computers to associate comic reading software with files and allow other non-comic products to use the standard extensions.

The ZIP format takes one or more files and compresses them as one file, with a .zip file extension. The RAR format does the same (and has better compression sometimes).

The TAR format is found primarily on UNIX and Linux operating systems; it can be used on Windows and Mac platforms, although the ZIP format has become the most popular. (Most users are not familiar with .tar files.) The .tar file bundles files together, although without any compression. If a user wishes to compress them, they are advised to use gzip (which turns the compressed file into *.tar.gz ) .

Software programs for making/opening/viewing the contents of these .zip, .rar and .tar files can be found on the Internet.

How do I make my own CBR, CBZ and CBT files?

Place all comic scans into a folder and rename them in page order, eg. 001 002 003 and then archive the files using WinZip, WinRAR or other compression software. Now just rename them with the different extentions. Remember .zip files are .cbz; .rar files are .cbr; and .tar files are .cbt. (Viewers, like CDisplay, can read .all of these file formats, among other extensions, but the de facto standard has become .cbz and .cbr. We recommend you use these two formats.)

You can rename a *.cbz file to a *.cbr file and CDisplay will still view it, although it isn’t recommended. (This might be because WinRAR can read both .zip and .rar files.) Please stick to the original file format/extension name, especially if you’re distributing files via DC++ and/or Bit Torrent.

Also, if you are using WinRAR to rar images into an archive for CDisplay to view, you can just rename the extension from *.rar to *.cbr before you actually start the archiving process.

What’s so good about these digital comic viewing programs?

They’re a great way of viewing image archives, including various options which are optimised for digital comics!

 Reading the comic books !!!!

Comic books - .cbz and .cbr files - CDisplay

http://www.fundazone.com/2007/09/comic-books-cbz-and-cbr-files-cdisplay/