PBZIP2 is a parallel implementation of the bzip2 block-sorting file compressor that uses pthreads and achieves near-linear speedup on SMP machines.
The output of this version is fully compatible with bzip2 v1.0.2 or newer (anything compressed with pbzip2 can be decompressed with bzip2).
PBZIP2 should work on any system that has a pthreads compatible C++ compiler (such as gcc).
Key Features
- Compress files larger than 4GB.
- Files are broken into pieces with each individual piece compressed. This enables compression to run faster on machines with multiple cores.
- Provides near-linear speedup with multi-core machines and 5-10% speed on hyperthreaded machines.
- Output is fully compatible with regular bzip2 data.
- Quiet mode.
- Cross-platform support – runs under Linux, macOS, and Windows.
Website: launchpad.net/pbzip2
Support:
Developer: Jeff Gilchrist
License: BSD-style license
PBZIP2 is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| Compression Tools | |
|---|---|
| LZ4 | Focused on compression and decompression speed |
| Zstandard | Fast compression algorithm, providing high compression ratios |
| brotli | Generic-purpose lossless compression algorithm |
| lzop | File compressor favoring speed over compression ratio |
| pigz | Parallel implementation of gzip |
| ouch | CLI tool for compressing and decompressing for various formats |
| pixz | Parallel, indexed xz compressor |
| gzip | Provides the standard GNU file compression utilities |
| BZip3 | Spiritual successor to BZip2 |
| bzip2 | Freely available, patent free, high-quality data compressor |
| PBZIP2 | Parallel implementation of bzip2 |
| lrzip | Achieve very high compression ratios and speed when used with large files |
| lbzip2 | Multi-threaded implementation of bzip2, suited for serial and parallel processing |
| plzip | Massively parallel lossless data compressor |
| p7zip-zstd | p7zip fork with additional codecs and improvements |
| 7-Zip | File archiver with a high compression ratio |
| ncompress | Fast, simple LZW file compressor |
| PXZ | Runs LZMA compression on multiple cores and processors |
| crabz | Like pigz but written in Rust |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
| Multi-Core Compression Tools | |
|---|---|
| Zstandard | Fast compression algorithm, providing high compression ratios |
| pigz | Parallel implementation of gzip. It's a fully functional replacement for gzip |
| pixz | Parallel indexing XZ compression, fully compatible with XZ. LZMA and LZMA2 |
| PBZIP2 | Parallel implementation of the bzip2 block-sorting file compressor |
| lrzip | Compression utility that excels at compressing large files |
| lbzip2 | Parallel bzip2 compression utility, suited for serial and parallel processing |
| plzip | Massively parallel (multi-threaded) lossless data compressor based on lzlib |
| crabz | Like pigz but written in Rust |
| PXZ | Runs LZMA compression on multiple cores and processors |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
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