[Request] Looking for COMPRESS.EXE v1.3 or 1.4
Earlier version of Microsoft's compress.exe program support a different compression method, supposedly based on PKZip code, and hence kept mostly internal.
So far I have located the following versions:
Microsoft (R) File Compression Utility Version 1.00 - Found in Microsoft Windows 3.0 SDK, but looks a bit different.
Microsoft (R) Compression Utility - Version 1.02 - found in Foxpro Distribution Kit for Windows 2.5a.
Microsoft (R) Compression Utility - Version 1.11 - found in leaked MS-DOS 6 source code on Vetusware.
One comment mentions that 1.3 was floating around out there at one point, but doesn't seem to be out there now.
1.4 should exist, as matching version of DECOMP.EXE are on many Microsoft installation media.
Most of the versions out there are 2.0, which lack the older (and better!) compression method. It seems there is at least a slight difference between files created with 1.11 and 1.4.
Any ideas?
(Edit: Just realized this would be better in requests)
Comments
I have Compress 1.3. Doesn't have anything different that v1.11, though.
Edit: Hope the attached isn't inappropriate. You know what to do with it.
Thanks!
Interesting... I am trying to recompress a file on a distribution disk, but it keeps coming out larger than the original. I was expecting this version to have some difference in compression, but it does not.
That means MS must have used some other utility to compress their distribution files.
They used COMPRESS.EXE v1.4, which added KWAJ type 4 compression, which is the same MS-ZIP (ie. Microsoft's implementation of Phil Katz's DEFLATE) that was later used in .CAB's. Unforrtunately, v1.4 seems to be impossible to find. I've been looking for it for over a decade now, to no avail. I have v1.11, v1.2, and v1.3, and maybe even a v1.0x, but not v1.4.