New package: XZ Utils

[willimm]

New awesome package.

This is the newer version of lzma utils. I think this should be in LFS, because:

• Compressed files with it are smaller than gziped or even bziped files.

• More packages are using it, and TexLive, one of those, only provides a LZMA version of the package, and we are thinking of replacing teTex with lzma.
• Slackware, the oldeset surviving distro, is now compressing their packages in lzma. This is what they say about it (from it's May 11 changelog):

"This batch of updates includes the newly released KDE 4.2.3, but more noticeably it marks the first departure from the use of gzip for compressing Slackware packages. Instead, we will be using xz, based on the LZMA compression algorithm. xz offers better compression than even bzip2, but still offers good extraction performance (about 3 times better than bzip2 and not much slower than gzip in our testing). Since support for bzip2 has long been requested, support for bzip2 and the original lzma format has also been added (why not?), but this is purely in the interest of completeness -- we think most people will probably want to use either the original .tgz or the new .txz compression wrappers. The actual Slackware package format (which consists of the layout within the package envelope) has not changed, but this is the first support within Slackware's package tools for using alternate compression algorithms."

• As mentoned in a post to LFS-dev, the kenel now supports compression with XZ.

It is VERY AWESOME!!! And, at least for me, it's a must-have in the book.

Xz is avabale at ​http://tukaani.org/xz/, and the latest version is 4.999.8beta (yes, it's a beta, but as with Speex, that version is recommended.)

I sugest you put this in the book.

Also, do not close as a duplicate of #2214, as that would not be fair. Putting this package into LFS is future-proofing: some day, most (if not all) packages will become xz-only.

Most distros (even Debian Stable) are including either XZ or LZMA with a default install. You're staying back, it's time to move foward.

[bdubbs@…]

The editors don't wan to do this at this time. It is more appropriate for BLFS. If you create a patch to BLFS, we'll review it and add it there. It would be appropriate in BLFS Chapter 11 where the LZMA-Utils are located.

[willimm]

Acualy, I think it's natural for it to be in LFS, because it goes along with gzip/bzip2.

But that's my two cents.

Also, please reopen this ticket, as XZ is so awesome, it needs to be in the book.