gzexe

GZEXE(1)                     General Commands Manual                    GZEXE(1)

NAME
     gzexe – create auto-decompressing executables

SYNOPSIS
     gzexe [-d] file ...

DESCRIPTION
     The gzexe utility uses gzip(1) to compress executables, producing
     executables that decompress on-the-fly when executed.  This saves disk
     space, at the cost of slower execution times.  The original executables are
     saved by copying each of them to a file with the same name with a ‘~’
     suffix appended.  After verifying that the compressed executables work as
     expected, the backup files can be removed.

     The options are as follows:

     -d      Decompress executables previously compressed by gzexe.

     The gzexe program refuses to compress non-regular or non-executable files,
     files with a setuid or setgid bit set, files that are already compressed
     using gzexe or programs it needs to perform on-the-fly decompression:
     sh(1), mktemp(1), rm(1), echo(1), tail(1), gzip(1), and chmod(1).

SEE ALSO
     gzip(1)

CAVEATS
     The gzexe utility replaces files by overwriting them with the generated
     compressed executable.  To be able to do this, it is required that the
     original files are writable.

macOS 12.1                      January 26, 2007                      macOS 12.1