PowerPacker
More info
- Creator
- Nico François
- Type
- Cruncher
- Platform
- Amiga (AmigaOS)
- Extension
- .pp
The Amiga's ubiquitous file packer, whose .pp files and shared library let programs load compressed data without noticing.
Nico François wrote it around 1990, and few Amiga programs escaped it. Packed files got the .pp extension, and tools like PPMore and PPShow displayed compressed text and images directly. A bundled powerpacker.library let any program open a packed file transparently — the contents were expanded into memory only on access.
On a machine whose floppies held 880 KB, this was often the difference between fitting and not. François later moved on to ReqTools and other system libraries, but for many it is the .pp icon that stuck. The rivals were Imploder and StoneCracker; PowerPacker won by being the easiest to simply use.