After close to 2 years of silence, WinZip Computing, Inc. (formally known as Nico Mak Computing, if I'm not mistaken), finally released their latest iteration of WinZip - WinZip version 8.0. The last version to be released was version 7.0 SR1 and that was two years ago.

One wonders what changes WinZip Computing has introduced in this version. Well, here's the abbreviated list of changes :

Enhanced WinZip Wizard

- WinZip Wizard functionality has been extended to allow you to create and update Zip files from the Wizard.
- The Wizard can now extract and install from MIME and other encoded files.
- The Wizard now supports automatic installation of desktop themes and screen savers

More Windows-like interface
- When you click the right mouse button on a file in the archive contents list, the context menu now displays any associated actions for the type of file selected. For example, right-clicking on a .DOC file (Microsoft Word document) might display "Open", "Print", and "New". As in Explorer, hold down the Shift key while clicking the right mouse button to add an "Open With ..." choice to the menu.
- Inclusion of subfolders when adding, updating, etc., is now automatic and mirrors Explorer's treatment of subfolders. You no longer have to check the "Include subfolders" checkbox; instead, WinZip determines when to include subfolders using the same logic that Explorer does.
- Optional new "Explorer-style" toolbar buttons are available.
- WinZip now displays a tooltip when a Zip file is selected in Windows Explorer. The tooltip shows how many files are in the archive and displays the archive comment, if there is one. If "View as Web Page" is enabled in Explorer, the information will instead appear in the description area of the web page.
- When you click the right mouse button on a file in the archive contents list, the pop-up menu now displays only file-related actions such as Extract.
- Under Windows 98 and Windows 2000, WinZip menus now display small icons corresponding to the menu items' toolbar buttons.

Desktop theme and screen saver support
- WinZip can install desktop themes and screen savers contained in Zip files.

Other changes
- Zip and E-Mail adds a new feature to the Windows Explorer context menu.
- WinZip can automatically display the Zip comment when opening a Zip file that contains a comment.
- When the open Zip contains a comment, WinZip displays a new icon on the Classic interface status line.
- Most of WinZip's major dialogs now have "What's This?" help.
- WinZip now displays an animated progress dialog during lengthy archive operations and can be minimized during such operations.
- The Miscellaneous tab of the Configuration dialog has several new options, allowing you to:
  a) set the number of recently used files listed in the File menu,
  b) enable or disable the theme/screen saver installer,
  c) automatically show comments when opening Zip files,
  d) enable or disable the animated status dialog used during long Zip operations, and
  e) restore all warning messages that you have previously turned off.
- A new option in the System tab of the Configuration dialog allows you to control whether dialogs are shown when you drag and drop files from Explorer onto an archive or a WinZip window.
- The list of recently used files in the Classic mode File menu has been enhanced:
- The case and capitalization of files in the list adhere to the preferences you have selected for files in the main WinZip window.
- WinZip no longer places in the list files that were automatically opened from the Windows temporary folder.
- A new button for Close Archive is available and can be added to the toolbar from the toolbar configuration dialog.
- If you click the View button and multiple files are selected, WinZip will perform the specified action on all selected files.
- The WinZip Self-Extractor Personal Edition is now a 32-bit program exclusively and no longer supports creation of 16-bit extractors.
- Winzip's Windows extensions are now 32-bit Explorer Shell extensions only.
- The System tab of the Configuration dialog has an option to change WinZip's associated file types.

Looks like a whole lot of changes, doesn't it? Well, there's no denying the fact that they have spruced up the GUI and added a lot of functionality to this version. Whether the majority of WinZip users will actually make use of the additional features though is quite another thing.

Of course, there's no doubt that the WinZip power user will gladly welcome the new features and clamour for even more. However, I believe most of the users would be more interested in the performance of the new WinZip, rather than its new usability features. In other words, is WinZip 8.0 a better archiver than WinZip 7.0? Let's find out.