zip-files
Command line utilities for creating zip files
What it is and what it does
zip-files is a command-line utility package that wraps Python's zip functionality to make it easy to create zip archives with custom root folder names and compression options. It provides two main commands: `zip-files` to bundle individual files from multiple locations into a single archive, and `zip-folder` to compress an entire directory tree. The package depends only on click for CLI argument handling.
The tool is designed for common tasks like packaging documentation for release or assembling files from scattered locations for distribution. It supports multiple compression methods (stored, deflated, bzip2, lzma), glob-pattern exclusions, version control system filtering, and .gitignore processing. However, the package has been abandoned since 2021-04-21 with no maintenance or updates since then.
Use it for:
- Package Sphinx documentation builds as versioned zip archives during Python package releases
- Bundle scattered report files and plots from different directories into a single email-ready archive
- Create deployable zip files with custom root folder names for distribution
- Exclude version control files and dotfiles from archives using command-line flags
- Apply different compression methods to reduce archive size for specific use cases
Worth the install?
AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying
Provides command-line tools to create zip files with arbitrary root folder names and compression methods, bundling files and directories from different filesystem locations.
No. While the package is lightweight and permissive-licensed, it has been abandoned since 2021-04-21 with no maintenance, no security updates, and no active development. For command-line zip creation, use Python's built-in zipfile module directly or consider actively maintained alternatives. The lack of maintenance poses a risk if bugs or compatibility issues arise.
Install
zip-files on PyPI
pip
pip install zip-filesuv
uv add zip-filespoetry
poetry add zip-filesInstalling zip-files
Before you install
Low install friction with a single lightweight dependency (click). However, the package is abandoned—last release was 2021-04-21 and no commits since then. It will not receive maintenance or security updates.
License in practice
BSD license is permissive and places minimal restrictions on use, modification, and distribution.
Quickstart
pip install zip_files
zip-folder --auto-root --outfile docs.zip ./docs
zip-files -o archive.zip ./file1.txt ./file2.txt
Verify before relying
- Whether the package works reliably with Python versions beyond 3.9
- Whether all compression methods (stored, deflated, bzip2, lzma) are fully functional
Package facts
| License | BSD license (permissive) |
| Python support | supports the current Python release (>=3.6) |
| Install friction | low — pure-Python wheel |
| Runtime dependencies | 1 — click |
| Maintenance | abandoned — 1,941 days since the last release |
| Last repo commit | |
| First released | |
| Downloads | 98,777/month — #13,061 on PyPI (30-day window, as of 2026-08-14) |
| Known vulnerabilities | none known (OSV.dev, checked 2026-08-14) |
Evidence: zip_files-0.4.1-py3-none-any.whl
Keywords: zip
Tags
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