ALZip is an open source archiving and compression utility for Microsoft Windows operating systems. ALZip is designed for use on Microsoft Windows, Macintosh, Mac OS X and Linux. ALZip can also decompress Zip and RAR files.

Because ALZip no longer provides the same functionality as the earlier Zip and RAR technologies, there has been a lot of discussion about how to make the best use of ALZip. There are currently many forks of ALZip that claim to perform the same tasks as the original ALZip but with additional features. The main change for the ALZip fork is to support multiple architectures and operating systems. The latest fork adds the ability to unpack Zip and RAR archives. In addition, the fork improves the security of ALZip by allowing users to create various options that restrict access to certain sections of a Zip or RAR archive.

A big advantage of ALZip over other open source archive formats is the ability to compile ALZip using the Visual Studio C# compiler. This capability allows you to create ALZip libraries that can be run in Visual Studio C# applications. The ability to compile and run ALZip code in Visual Studio C# applications provides the programmer with the ability to create and deploy an application that uses the ALZip file extension. These capabilities have made ALZip one of the most widely used free and open source storage solutions.