Configuring WinZip

The Preferences window lets you configure the default behavior of WinZip®. You can access the Preferences window by clicking on Preferences from the WinZip menu.

The Preference window has five sections:

General

The General pane of the Preferences window displays all the current default preference settings for WinZip and allows the defaults to be changed.

  1. Automatic Open: if this option is checked, when opening a Zip file that contains only one file in it, WinZip will unzip the file and open it in its associated program. This only happens if WinZip considers the kind of file to be safe, such as iWork and Microsoft Office files.
  2. Updates: if this option is checked, WinZip will check for updates weekly. If an update is found, a "notification" screen is displayed.
  3. Include: if this option is checked, WinZip will zip hidden files when zipping folders that contain hidden files.
  4. Messages: Press this "Restire all caution messages" button to restore the "Add complete" dialog and all caution messages.
  5. New file location: specifies the default location where new files are saved. Each time the user saves a Zip file to a new location, the "New file location" will save the new location as the default location.
  6. Actions unzip folder: specify the default location for 1-click unzip all files on the Actions pane.
  7. Default Format: specifies the compression format to use when creating or adding to a Zip file. The choices are Zip (compatibility), Zipx (best compression), and LHA.
  8. Encryption Method: specifies the encryption method to use when the encryption option is selected during the Zipping operation. Encryption is only supported for Zip and Zipx compression methods. The choices are AES 128-bit, AES 256-bit, and ZIP 2.0.
  9. Replace existing items when Unzipping: this option specifies what WinZip should do when you unzip items from a Zip file and items with the same name already exist in the destination location. The options are "Ask me what to do", "Replace the existing item", and "Keep the existing item".
File Types

The File Types pane of the Preferences window displays all the kinds of files that can be associated with WinZip by default and allows the defaults to be changed.

  1. File Types: WinZip displays a list of supported file types. By default, WinZip will set all of these file types to open in WinZip when they are double-clicked from Finder, Mail, etc.
  2. Associated Programs: A drop down menu for each file type lists WinZip Mac and any other programs that can open that file type. Select the program that you want to use to open files of that type by default.
Cloud Service

The Cloud Service pane of the Preferences window displays the cloud storage services available in WinZip. One can Login and Log out of a cloud service or set a default cloud service from this pane also.

  1. Cloud Service Name: WinZip supports these cloud storage services: ZipShare, Google Drive, and Dropbox.
  2. Status: Displays the space usage of the cloud storage service when logged into the corresponding cloud storage service.
  3. Login/Log out: Use this section to Login to and Log out of the corresponding cloud storage service.
  4. Set default: Use this section to set the corresponding cloud storage service as the default cloud storage service.
Watermark settings

The Watermark Settings pane of the Preferences window displays the Watermark images options available in WinZip. This feature requires WinZip Mac Pro or is also available while WinZip Mac is in eval mode.

  1. Placement: select the position where the watermark will be placed. The default is in the center of the image.
  2. Direction: select the direction of how the watermark will look when placed in the image: horizontal, vertical, diagonal bottom left to top right, or diagonal top left to bottom right.
  3. Transparency: select how transparent that the watermark will be--0% (fully visible) to 50% transparent.
  4. Font: this button will open the usual Windows Font dialog where you can select the font options to use for the watermark text.
  5. Text: set what text will show in the watermark. The default is Confidential, do not copy.
  6. Include a date stamp: select this checkbox to automatically append a date stamp to the watermark text. Note that you can choose to include both a date and time stamp.
  7. Include a time stamp: select this checkbox to automatically append a time stamp to the watermark text. Note that you can choose to include both a date and time stamp.
Filters

  1. Filters list: shows a list of the available filters. Select "+" to create a new filter, select "-" to delete the selected filter. Note: the default filter can not be deleted.
  2. Filter Include: shows a list of the filter patterns of files to be included.
  3. Filter Exclude: shows a list of the filter patterns of files to be excluded.