Smart Archiver

VSCode extension for creating, extracting, and browsing archives — powered by a bundled native 7-Zip (with a 7-Zip WebAssembly fallback) and native zstd/lz4/brotli codecs (brotli via Node.js zlib), with the WASM engine as the final fallback. Works out of the box with no local 7-Zip install, at near-desktop speed.

Renamed from smart-archive to smart-archiver: the previous marketplace listing (yjdyamv.smart-archive) was deleted and its name can no longer be republished, so this extension ships under the new ID yjdyamv.smart-archiver. If you are upgrading, re-apply your settings (the section is now smart-archiver.* instead of smart-archive.*) and re-bind any keybindings that referenced the old command IDs (e.g. yjdyamv.smart-archive.compress).

Features

Compress to 7z, ZIP, RAR5, TAR, WIM, tar.gz, tar.bz2, tar.xz, tar.zst, tar.lz4, tar.br, tar.sz
Decompress from 40+ formats: 7z, ZIP, RAR (v4/v5), TAR, GZ, BZ2, XZ, CAB, ISO, VHD, DEB, RPM, ...
AES-256 encryption — password-protect 7z, ZIP, and RAR5 archives (7z with header encryption, RAR5 with inline recovery records and recovery volumes)
Native 7-Zip engine — the bundled 7-Zip binary covers Windows, Linux (x64/arm64) and macOS (arm64), no install needed; platforms without a native build (macOS x64, Linux arm, Windows ia32) fall back to the WASM engine. In auto mode the bundled binary is preferred; a system 7-Zip is used only when it is at least as capable (newer than the bundled fork with the same codecs). Choose explicitly via smart-archiver.backend.7z (auto/native/bundled/wasm)
Archive browser — opens as the default editor for archives: virtual-scrolled tree, search with regex or fuzzy match, sort by name/size, multi-select for partial extract, add/delete/rename files right inside the view
Keyboard navigation — Arrow keys, PageUp/PageDown (scroll viewport), Home/End, Space to toggle selection, Enter to extract, Delete to remove, Ctrl+A to select all
File preview — double-click any file to open it in VS Code
Copy/paste — select files in the archive browser, paste them to any local folder
Multi-volume support — auto-resolves RAR .r00–.r99 / .partN.rar and split 7z/zip .001–.N volumes
Bilingual UI — English / Simplified Chinese / Traditional Chinese (auto-detected from VS Code locale)
Large file handling — archives and files beyond 2 GiB via chunked I/O (2 GiB file boundary split into 100 MB chunks)
Security — Zip Slip protection, configurable size limits (k/m/g units), path traversal blocking, decompression bomb detection
Smart exclude — automatically skips node_modules, .git, dist, .venv, and 30+ other noisy directories when compressing; customizable via settings
CJK filename recovery — fixes GBK-encoded filenames in old archives (Shift-JIS / EUC-KR are byte-indistinguishable from GBK and not recoverable)
Context menu integration — right-click files to compress, right-click archives to decompress or browse

Quick Start

npm install               # installs root + webview-ui deps
npm run build             # build Vue frontend + extension

Press F5 in VS Code to launch the Extension Development Host.

Development note: building/developing this repository runs stage:natives, which downloads and unpacks the bundled 7-Zip binaries. A fresh checkout therefore needs 7-Zip installed locally to bootstrap the staging — required on Windows (install from https://www.7-zip.org/), recommended on Linux/macOS (p7zip/7zz via your package manager). End users do not need a local 7-Zip: the VSIX already bundles the binaries.

Usage

Action	How
Compress	Right-click file(s)/folder(s) → `Smart Archiver: Compress` → pick format → optional password → save
Decompress	Right-click archive → `Smart Archiver: Decompress` → optional password → extracts to `<name>.extracted/`
Browse	Right-click archive → `Smart Archiver: Browse Contents`, or double-click the archive file

Archive Browser Shortcuts

Key	Action
`↑` `↓`	Move selection up/down (hold Shift to extend)
`PageUp` `PageDown`	Scroll viewport by one page + move selection
`Home` `End`	Jump to first/last item
`Space`	Toggle checkbox on anchor item
`Enter`	Extract selected items
`Delete`	Delete selected items
`F2`	Rename single selected item
`Ctrl+A`	Select all visible items
`Ctrl+C`	Copy selected paths
`Escape`	Clear selection / close context menu

Supported Formats

Compression (create)

Format	Encryption	Notes
7z	AES-256	Best ratio, solid archive, header encryption
zip	AES-256 (7-Zip default)	Universal compatibility
rar	AES-256	RAR5 creation, header encryption, multi-volume, recovery records
tar	—	No compression, archive only
tar.gz	—	TAR + GZip
tar.bz2	—	TAR + BZip2
tar.xz	—	TAR + XZ
tar.zst	—	TAR + Zstandard
tar.lz4	—	TAR + LZ4
tar.br	—	TAR + Brotli
tar.sz	—	TAR + Snappy
wim	—	Windows Imaging Format

Decompression (extract)

All formats supported by 7-Zip (including CAB, ARJ, LZH, CHM, MSI, ISO, VHD, VMDK, DEB, RPM, CPIO, UHA, XAR, DMG, FAT, NTFS, SquashFS, ...) — 40+ in total.

Configuration

Setting	Default	Description
`smart-archiver.default.format`	`7z`	Default archive format
`smart-archiver.default.compressionLevel`	`5`	Compression level (0=store, 5=normal, 9=ultra)
`smart-archiver.limits.maxArchiveSize`	`"1g"`	Max size of the compressed archive file itself; warning threshold when the WASM fallback loads the whole archive into memory. Extraction and single-file preview can continue after confirmation
`smart-archiver.limits.maxExtractTotalSize`	`"10g"`	Max total size of all files after one extraction
`smart-archiver.backend.7z`	`"auto"`	7-Zip engine: `auto` (bundled native→system, only if at least as capable→WASM), `native` (system only), `bundled` (bundled native only), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.backend.zstd`	`"auto"`	Zstd engine: `auto` (system→bundled native→WASM), `native` (system only), `bundled` (bundled native only), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.backend.brotli`	`"auto"`	Brotli engine: `auto`/`native` (Node.js zlib), `bundled` (bundled native 7-Zip), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.backend.lz4`	`"auto"`	LZ4 engine: `auto` (bundled native→WASM), `bundled` (bundled native only), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.backend.rar`	`"auto"`	RAR5 engine: `auto` (native binding→WASM), `native` (Node binding only), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.backend.snappy`	`"auto"`	Snappy (tar.sz): `auto` (native addon→WASM), `native` (Node addon only), `wasm` (WASM only)
`smart-archiver.patterns.collapsedDirs`	`[30+ patterns]`	Directory patterns kept collapsed in preview
`smart-archiver.patterns.compressExclude`	`[30+ patterns]`	Patterns excluded when compressing
`smart-archiver.volumes.sizes`	`[built-in presets]`	Custom split volume size presets (empty `{}` falls back to the built-in presets)

Requirements

VS Code 1.85.0 or later
System 7-Zip/zstd (optional, for faster operations):
- Windows: winget install 7zip zstd
- macOS: brew install sevenzip zstd
- Linux: apt install 7zip zstd (or your package manager)

Development

npm install              # installs root + webview-ui deps
npm run build            # build webview + compile (one step)
npm run watch            # watch the extension compile (F5 loop)
npm run dev:webview      # browser preview of the UI (localhost:5173, HMR, mock data)
npm run lint             # oxlint static analysis
npm run typecheck        # TypeScript type checking
npm run format           # oxfmt code formatting
npm run check            # format + lint + typecheck
npm run test             # vitest (extension tests)
npm --prefix webview-ui test   # vitest (webview UI tests)
npm run package:cross    # create .vsix (clean install + staged natives)
npm run release          # check + package:cross (pre-release validation)

Quick dev workflow: npm install → npm run build → F5 in VS Code.

UI development, two flows:

Browser preview (fastest): npm run dev:webview serves the webview UI at http://localhost:5173 with HMR and a mock archive (webview-ui/src/devMock.ts simulates the host: lazy tree expansion, search, selection). No VS Code needed — ideal for iterating on components.

Real panel: run the VS Code watch build task (extension compile + webview rebuild on save; npm run watch alone covers the extension side), press F5 to open the Extension Development Host, open an archive, then reload the webview panel (re-open the archive or Developer: Reload Window) after each change.

Dependencies

Package	Purpose
7-Zip ZS WebAssembly	Bundled WASM fallback (`vendor/7zz-wasm`, downloaded at install) — all compression & extraction; final fallback for zstd/brotli/lz4
7-Zip ZS native	Bundled native binary (`vendor/7z-bin`, staged at build) — main engine and the native fast path for zstd/lz4/brotli streams
smart-archive-rar	RAR5 creation engine — native napi-rs binding with a WASI (`wasm32-wasip1-threads`) fallback; AES-256, header encryption, multi-volume, recovery records, progress
snappy	Snappy codec for tar.sz — napi-rs binding with a WASI fallback
Node.js `zlib` (built-in)	Brotli native fast path
iconv-lite	CJK filename encoding recovery
Vue 3	Archive browser UI
TanStack Virtual	Virtual scrolling for large archives

Security

Untrusted archives — whenever a native 7-Zip is used (the bundled binary by default, or a system install), extraction refuses archives containing symbolic-link entries and enforces the configured size limits before writing, guarding against path-traversal writes and decompression bombs. The archive browser renders attacker-controlled entry names under a strict Content-Security-Policy.
Native vs sandboxed parsing — by default (auto) archives are parsed by a native 7-Zip process, which is fast but runs C/C++ format handlers on untrusted input. To parse untrusted archives inside the WebAssembly sandbox instead, set smart-archiver.backend.7z to wasm.
Passwords on shared machines — passwords are piped to native 7-Zip through stdin (Enter password: prompt), never passed as a command-line argument, so they do not appear in the process list. The WASM engine similarly keeps passwords inside the extension process.

License

Proprietary. See LICENSE.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to everyone who contributed and the friendly community!