Uncompress .7z file with password [Solved]

[Ole Juul]

I'm feeling like a complete newbie on this. I have a file with a .7z extension. I have the password. I installed p7zip.

I type: p7zip -d file.7z
or p7zip x file.7z
or p7zip x file.7z -pMypassword

All I get is "Error: Can not open file as archive." or the help file which reads:

  -h print this help
  -d decompress file

OK, so I try: -d instead of x as suggested in most places, but it still doesn't work. Half an hour of net search and I cannot find a command that works for me, and the suggestions vary considerably. Does anyone know for sure what I should type?

[dibl]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Have you ever tried xarchiver? It's kind of the Swiss army knife of compression utilities. For CLI-impaired folks, like me ....

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Install xarchiver if it isn't already installed. Open Dolphin and navigate to the file. Right click the .7z file and in the menu that comes up, go down to 'extract to.' The xarchiver box should come up with a box for the password, click in that box and enter the pass, then click on 'extract' at the bottom.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Xarchver sounds like an excellent suggestion. I installed it and also the full 7zip program. What happens is it gives an error like this:

7-Zip (A) 4.57 Copyright (c) 1999-2007 Igor Pavlov 2007-12-06
p7zip Version 4.57 (locale=en_GB.UTF-8,Utf16=on,HugeFiles=on,1 CPU)

Processing archive: /home/ole/DOS-down/z/pc20.7z

Enter password (will not be echoed) :
Error: Can not open encrypted archive. Wrong password?

It does not ask for a password so I don't know what to do. The only place for a password is earlier on in the "Extract files from archive" menu, but that is just a greyed out window so I can't put it in there.

This is probably an ISO, so perhaps it is supposed to work automagically in some MS-Windows program or other. I have no idea what is exactly is in the archive, but I'm expecting it to be in a form that I can put on a DOS machine and write a disk from there. The file description says it has been compressed and encrypted with 7-Zip 9.x and gives the password. Perhaps this has to be unencrypted first. I don't know.

I think I'm going to give up and try another source for what I want. At least now I am aware of xarchiver and have one more thing in my toolkit. Thanks all for your help.

PS: In case anyone is wondering what I'm up to, this is supposed to be a copy of IBM PC DOS 2.0 (from 1983). I am currently working with PC-DOS v1.1 which is commonly distributed on the net for study purposes. V2.0 is equally historical, but perhaps this is a nono to distribute. Forgive me if this is considered borderline - I'll gladly buy a copy when it becomes available.

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Are you running xarchiver directly, or did you follow my instructions, and right-click on the file and select 'extract to' which is supposed to launch xarchiver, prompting you for the password.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Are you running xarchiver directly, or did you follow my instructions, and right-click on the file and select 'extract to' which is supposed to launch xarchiver, prompting you for the password.

Oops, no. But I did just now and it looks the same. To describe exactly.

- Right click on file
- Open with (select xarchiver)
- Popup: An error occurred while accessing the archive. Do you want to view the command line output?
- Click Yes
- Another popup: empty window
- Close that empty window and I am left in xarchiver which says:

echoed):   0   0   (will password          Enter
archive   0   0   is /home/ole/DOS-down/z/pc20.7z Error:

The bottom of the window says "Operation failed"

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

- Right click on file
- Open with (select xarchiver)

Select the 'Extract Archive To...' option. You will then be prompted to enter the password.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Select the 'Extract Archive To...' option. You will then be prompted to enter the password.

Ah, yes. That looks better. However that will only use Ark (it says) and I still get an error.

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

I just tested it. Created a passworded .7z archive using 7z and then navigated to the file using Dolphin, right-clicked on the file and chose Extract Archive To.. and was prompted for a password, which I provided, and the file was properly extracted to the destination I chose. It works.

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Uninstall xarchiver - you don't need it. The package p7zip-full is all you need. It contains two archive utilities: 7za and 7z. p7zip-full is what I installed, and for my test, used the command:

7z a -pTesting WPs.7z *

while in my Wallpapers directory to create the WPs.zip with the password Testing. Then, as said, I opened Dolphin and navigated to my Wallpaper directory, right-clicked on the WPs.7z file, selected Extract Archive To... and a password prompt window was presented. Typed in Testing and pressed Enter and it was extracted.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Thanks Showhog. OK, I now unistalled xarchiver. I already have p7zip-full.

I don't have Dolphin, and am using Konqueror. I can right click on the file and choose properties and access a little wrench icon which allows me to input programs. There I chose 7z and:

When I right click on the file and chose Extract Archive To, it comes up with a popup saying "An error occurred while trying to open the archive"

I think the file is not good. I downloaded two separate copies just to make sure, but I guess there is something else wrong. Perhaps Linux doesn't know what to do with an 8 sector per track 320K floppy image or something. I was hoping to just handle that myself since I don't have an appropriate drive in my Kubuntu box.

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Okay. I just tested extracing the .7z passworded archive from the CLI with:

7z e PWs.7z

paul@myotherbrain:~/Wallpapers/Junk$ 7z e WPs.7z

7-Zip 9.04 beta Copyright (c) 1999-2009 Igor Pavlov 2009-05-30
p7zip Version 9.04 (locale=en_US.UTF-8,Utf16=on,HugeFiles=on,2 CPUs)

Processing archive: WPs.7z


Enter password (will not be echoed) :

Typed in Testing and pressed enter. The archive was unzipped.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password

Okay. I just tested extracing the .7z passworded archive from the CLI with:

7z e PWs.7z

. . . Typed in Testing and pressed enter. The archive was unzipped.

W00t!! It worked! Showhog, you're brilliant! Now I have a file called "Disk1.img" which
looks like what I expected. I have to go and eat first, but I'll report back with my (hopefully) successful time travel back to March of 1983 when hierarchical file structure first came to DOS.

[Snowhog]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password [Solved]

Happy to have assisted.

[Ole Juul]

Re: Uncompress .7z file with password [Solved]

Yep, the disk boots just fine on an IBM 5150. This particular one has the first, and quite rare, planar with 64KB max. I'll need it all though because PC DOS 2.0 takes 24KB - exactly twice the memory of version 1.1.

One of these days, I think I'll set up an early 386 with SLS or Yggdrasil Linux. In case anybody here is interested in historical Linux there's a good collection at ibiblio.