The SQX-Archiver is an open and free data compression

Data compression

In computer science and information theory, data compression, source coding or bit-rate reduction is the process of encoding information using fewer bits than the original representation would use....

 and archival

File archiver

A file archiver is a computer program that combines a number of files together into one archive file, or a series of archive files, for easier transportation or storage...

 format

File format

A file format is a particular way that information is encoded for storage in a computer file.Since a disk drive, or indeed any computer storage, can store only bits, the computer must have some way of converting information to 0s and 1s and vice-versa. There are different kinds of formats for...

. It can be used in one's own applications free of charge (license and royalty free). The homepage provides an SDK

Software development kit

A software development kit is typically a set of software development tools that allows for the creation of applications for a certain software package, software framework, hardware platform, computer system, video game console, operating system, or similar platform.It may be something as simple...

, with source and compiled DLLs

Dynamic-link library

Dynamic-link library , or DLL, is Microsoft's implementation of the shared library concept in the Microsoft Windows and OS/2 operating systems...

 which are likewise unencumbered by license costs.

The format was designed by Speedproject for Squeez and it is also supported by TUGZip

TUGZip

TUGZip is a freeware file archiver for Microsoft Windows. It handles a great variety of archive formats, including some of the commonly used ones like zip, rar, gzip, bzip2, sqx and 7z...

.

The main advantages of SQX format are

• Main compressor is an LZH variant supporting LZ dictionaries from 32K up to 4096K
• Ultra compression mode with dictionary up to 32768K
• Several compressor extensions to handle multimedia data
• High-speed audio (WAV) compressor
• Special compressor stage for IA32 executables
• Solid and non-solid archives support
• Strong 128/256-bit AES encryption (Rijndael) for file data
• Independent encryption of archive directories
• Internal and external data recovery records
• Full support for 64-bit file systems (the size of archives and archive volumes is limited only by the OS)
• Support for digitally signed archives (envelope up to 512 bit, encrypted with 2 * 1024 bit)
• SFX modules for DOS (32-bit PMode), Win32 and x64. All SFX modules support multi-volume archives
• Archive and file comments