EDENWAITH  You are correct that the file should be smaller after you have compressed it (using a format such as gz, bz2, Z, or 7z). There are cases where the compression is very small and does not provide for much benefit, especially if the file (or group of files) are already in a compressed format. An example is if you are trying to compress a JPG image, which is already a compressed format, so trying to shrink it even further does not help a ton. However, trying to compress a large text document should have decent results.

The only other way I could see a file increasing in size, is if you only archived it (tar), which just packs a file (or usually, a group of files) into a single file, but it does not compress it.  
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CELEBRITARIAN  Usually, people who leave comments similar to yours, are both ignorant and unintelligent. However, they don't know about their own ignorance.

--> Of course, the purpose of compressing files and folders is to make them _smaller_.

I'm sorry to hear that this app didn't decrease the size of your stuff -- however, don't blame this app, GUI Tar is not responsible. Open the Terminal -> write "tar", "zip" or "bzip2" (or whatever type of compression you tried).

GUI Tar is only a wrapper--a Graphical User Interface to these built-in tools.

--> If you have a folder of already compressed files (like zip, tar, gzip -- or mp3, mpg, m4v, jpg and others) you should not expect more free disk space, though.

However, compressing a bunch of folders would usually save you either much or some disk space.

Compressing compressed files is not efficient, and usually only a waste of time and CPU power.

Maybe that's what you did?  
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SAMANTHA MEAGAN  To respond to celebritarian's comment, I don't think it was necessary to be so rude and bellitling! Just because someone does not understand one thing does not mean you should just assume that they are ignorant and unintelligent. Would you appreciate such an assumption about you?  
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THIRROUARD  The answer of celebritarian was rude, but I think it wasn't due to the commenter ignorance, but the way this guy was bullying the developper in a very pervert way, when it was actually not the fault of the developper...

But I agree there is never any need to be agressive :)

Don't worry, be happy ^_^  
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KVICKSILVER  Samantha: You wrote that reply rather late, I wrote that comment a long time ago. How you interpret my comment and its tone is your opinion. I hear what you're saying, and I do understand your point.

I give you this: Off course I didn't want to be a big happy smile when replying to a post like that. Personally, I think the most of what I wrote was kind of on-topic and related to his problem/disappointment with the application.

Sure, my comment did contain some sense of humor (at least I tried)... Call it irony. Did you _not_ think I was suggesting a likely answer to why his files didn't get smaller by using GUI Tar?

I think I did.

Thirrouard obviously got the point (the part about me being aggressive was axeggarated, though ;-) I feel quite calm). I wasn't rude without reasons. This is a free app. Some guy (or girl) has put a lot of effort, skills and time in making this a nice GUI to the Unix tools -- like tar.

--> These tools -- like tar -- is in there, behind the beautiful Mac OS X interface. Go to /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app, once in the Terminal, write: "man tar". All Mac OS X versions have it, deep down.

That's the main concern: The Unix tool tar _works_. GUI Tar is like many other apps, only a GraphicalUserInterface for these tools. That means you can't blame this app for bad compression rates on some random (unknown?) files.

It is free. It uses free tools to do the job the user wants. Don't blame the developer. That's basically what I wanted to say: Millions of applications are available, free of charge, gratis, free, whatever.

Why? Because there are persons who develop great software and makes it available for everybody -- like us -- for free. Personally, I found it very rude to whine about whatever problem you have with an app, which you've obtained for free and which the developer doesn't get a nickel for.

Especially when the developer obviously hasn't done anything wrong. --> Take it or leave it. It's free: If you appreciate it, well, show it! If you don't like it, don't immediately start complaining.

Greetings,

celebritarian — not a developer. ;-)  
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THIRROUARD  Well, I don't totally agree.

Free software or not, developers need feedback to improve their software. If you have any real problem, then it's good to let the developer know.

So I think you can complain about things, like bugs, or lack of feature, as long as you say it in a constructive way, and obviously this was not the case here ;)  
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