Universal Extractor is a program do to exactly what it says: extract files from any type of archive, whether it's a simple zip file, an installation program, or even a Windows Installer (.msi) package. This is still a work in progress (see details below), but so far it's proven quite useful and I feel others can also benefit from it.
I should stress that this application is not intended to be a general purpose archiving program. It will never replace WinRAR, 7-Zip, etc. What it will do is allow you to extract files from virtually any type of archive, regardless of source, compression method, etc. The original motivation behind this project was that I wanted an easy, convenient way to extract files from installation packages, such as Inno Setup or Windows Installer packages, without pulling up a command line every time. In the process I got a little carried away and ended up throwing in support for every kind of archive format I possibly could find.
Universal Extractor, like most of my Windows programs, is written in AutoIt, a powerful open source scripting language. Universal Extractor itself, however, is just a front-end that uses many other programs to do the dirty work. Please see the Credits section below for additional information.
1.5 (02/22/2007):
Added filetype signature scanning via TrID; no longer dependent on extensions Added support for Adobe Reader 7.x and 8.x installers Added support for Base64, Quoted-Printable, UUencoded, and yEnc files via uudeview Added support for Gentee, Installer VISE, and SetupFactory installers via cmdTotal + InstallExplorer Added support for InstallShield 3.x SFX installers via stix Added support for InstallShield 5.x CAB files via i5comp Added support for Itsy packages (.ipk) Added support for Outlook Express (DBX) archives via cmdTotal + DBX Plugin Added support for Pea archives Added support for SIS (SymbianOS) installers via cmdTotal + PDunSIS Added support for StuffIt packages (.sit, but not .sitx) Added support for Windows Installer patch (.msp) files via 7-zip and cmdTotal + MSI Plugin Added support for Zoo archives via booz Added support for files without an extension (eg, unknown files) Added /noappendext, /noremovedupe, /noremovetemp parameters to installer Added .dbx, .msp, .pea, and .sit file associations to installer Added Polish, Russian, and Slovak translations Fixed bug that prevented extraction of UPXed Zip and 7-Zip installers Fixed bug in Inno Setup installer detection Fixed potential file output bug in some installers, mainly InstallShield Fixed ACE SFX error handling to continue processing if extraction fails Fixed InstallShield cache mode handling to prevent hangs Removed 'i6comp by group' option for InstallShield cabs Removed expand.exe in favor of using 7-Zip for Microsoft Compressed files Removed .in_, .oc_, .sr_, .1, .bin, .imf, .lib, and .wz file associations from installer Updated UniExtract to scan signatures by default; extensions used as backup Updated UniExtract to display icon in system tray during extraction Updated UniExtract to select Cancel by default on PEiD and log prompts Updated UniExtract internationalization support to simplify translation Updated UniExtract with many code changes to increase robustness, simplicity, and efficiency wherever possible Updated support for Inno Setup, NSIS, Wise Installer, and InstallShield via cmdTotal + InstallExplorer Updated ACE support to include non-PE ACE SFX archives Updated BIN/CUE support with better conversion support and validation Updated InstallShield 3.x archives support by adding STIX extraction option Updated InstallShield CAB support to display progress dialog Updated InstallShield cache extraction to support multiple nested MSIs Updated InstallShield cache extraction to better detect installer window Updated InstallShield support to provide choice of isxunpack or cache mode Updated MHTML support to include option for extraction via cmdTotal + MHT Packer Plugin Updated Wise Installer support to include non-PE Wise installers Updated Wise Installer support to include unzip option Updated Wise Installer support to append missing file extensions Updated Wise Installer support to provide option for removing temporary files Updated Microsoft SFX CAB support for better detection and robustness Updated Windows Installer support to append missing file extensions Updated Windows Installer support to include option for extraction via cmdTotal + MSI Packer Plugin Updated AutoIt to 3.2.2.0 Updated bin2iso to 1.95 Updated Inno Setup to 5.1.9 Updated UnRAR to 3.62
