Why does a zip file appear larger than the source file especially when it is text?
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PeanutsMonkey
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Published on 2012-08-29T06:39:59Z
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2012/08/29
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I have a text file that is 19 bytes in size and having compressed the file using zip and 7zip, it appears to be larger. I had a read of the question on Why is a 7zipped file larger than the raw file? as well as Why doesn't ZIP Compression compress anything? but considering the file is not already compressed I would have expected further compression. Attached is a screenshot.
EDIT0
I took the example further by creating a file that contained random data as follows dd if=/dev/urandom of=sample.log bs=1G count=1
and attempted to compress the file using both zip and 7zip however there were no compression gains. Why is that?
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