I'm using Windows 2000 in a virtual
session because I'm going to talk about
some command line stuff at 7-zip which
is decidedly old-school but you know
what it's good to know this stuff anyway
because if you ever decide to run batch
files or scripts and windows when you
need to archive things it's good to know
the sevens of command line version of it
now I have the latest version even in
Windows 2000 year 9.20
and you'll notice that in the Help
section there is command line version oh
okay well where is that it is in the
7-zip directory so if I launch command
let me just make this bigger so you can
see it better so if I go to Program
Files 7-zip dir it's right here 7z exe
and you would run it from here
let me just minimize this for a second I
have this here - this is this this is
64-bit Windows 7 it's still C Drive
Program Files sevens up so if you're on
32-bit Windows 2000 32-bit XP 64-bit XP
32-bit Vista or 7 or 64-bit this door 7
it's always in the same place which is C
program files
7-zip let's get back to 2000 here there
we go so if we do 7z with nothing and
press Enter tell us all the stuff we can
do with it it's most likely true all you
want to do is add which is just a if you
want to extract e it's easy to remember
a to add e to extract
the way that it works pretty simple it's
probably true you want to stick to the
7z format and I have a folder on my
desktop called test which is just a
bunch of files that I downloaded some
ccleaner versions and some flash players
stuff and whatnot now if I want to
compress this using excuse me create an
archive using the command line version I
have to type out the entire path and
also set the destination and all that
other good stuff whatever Bay here's how
it's done so it's 7z a so we're going to
start with the actual program which is
7z you could type it as 7z exe if you
want to it's not necessary just 7z and
then a there's no - because you'll
notice that the commands are different
from the switches if using a command
there's no - if you're using a switch
there is a - and for the next part here
I will be adding a switch which is a T
which is type and it's just 7z so I'm
going to launch 7-zip add to archive set
the type to 7z and the next part is the
name of the file you want to create now
I want this file to appear on the
desktop so let me launch another command
prompt here this would be easy to do in
Windows 7 because I have the address bar
up here but oh well so see documents and
settings administrator desktop ok so
oops didn't mean to right-click there
and edit mark enter to copy okay because
this location has spaces in the pathname
I have to put its around it in quotes so
I'll do this quote right click see
documents under here Desktop backslash
test dot 7z so so far I have 7z add to
an archive type of 7z to this archive
name in this location and I say okay
what files do I want to add to the
archive again the location has spaces in
the path name so quote document settings
administrator desktop slash test
wildcard and what this means is I want
to add okay I'll go over it again launch
7-zip add to archive or the type of
7-zip to this archive and have
everything in this folder which is
actually right here add into that
archive and if all goes well I press
ENTER it will do it which it does and it
gives a nice little progress meter is
going along when it's done we should see
it right here which would be in just a
moment this is a little slow because I'm
running it in virtual session everything
is ok ah there it is if I open it up
tada
there's all my stuff now you'll notice
it did not include the folders now the
reason it didn't include the folders
because I didn't tell it to you can do
what's called a recursive
this is one I believe one of the flags
here include exclude include filenames
yeah there is recur subdirectory so if I
was to do this again let me just delete
that okay so that would be F 3 oh no
actually up there we go so if I go back
here in in addition to the T flag
I add the our flag which will
recursively as it says right here recur
sub directories it will include
everything in the test folder and the
subfolders underneath it let's go to the
end of the line here and go and if all
goes well it should recurse the
subdirectory yes I did see right there
it's doing it
and we'll just wait till it's finished
by the way when you do this it should be
a lot faster again because of running
this in a virtual session
all right any day now there it goes
and there it is if I double-click and it
has the recurse sub-directories in it
fantastic so if you want to run 7-zip
from the command line the easiest way to
do it is to actually launch the file
manager first go into the help section
and just read up on the syntax because
I've only done just the basic basic
stuff on how to do this and it has right
here a which I showed you add bench
delete extract list test
update extract with full path and then
all the switches I covered a type of
archive and this recursive and there's
more options to recursive so you want to
check that out
and you don't have to use 7z all it also
shows you how to do or if you want to
split an archive from the command line
so be sure to check that out too so if
you wanted to break up an iso file or
something like that
lots of good reading in there so if you
want to do things from the command line
and script up a bunch of 7z stuff it's
good stuff to know