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defaultehwmw5o5armd
Known Participant
July 16, 2021
Question

Mac Zip disk

  • July 16, 2021
  • 5 replies
  • 2936 views

Can InDesign open a zip disk or do we need to unzip the files first then open them in InDesign?

 

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5 replies

Dave Creamer of IDEAS
Community Expert
Dave Creamer of IDEASCommunity Expert
Community Expert
July 18, 2021

You have posted twice on this subject--Zip disks and zip files. The other post was about trying to open old PageMaker files in InDesign.

 

With all the advice you have received, if you can't get anything working yet, it might be time to hire a consultant to [try to] get your files working. 

David Creamer: Community Expert (ACI and ACE 1995-2023)
    Brad @ Roaring Mouse
    Community Expert
    Brad @ Roaring MouseCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    July 18, 2021

    It might help to see some screen shots of what you are seeing on your computer. re: what shows up in Disk Utility for your ZIP Drive; what's listed for files if you are able to mount it, etc.

      Lukas Engqvist
      Community Expert
      Lukas EngqvistCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      July 18, 2021

      Is it that you want to "Place" a file from your external ZIP drive? As stated before InDesign opens indesign templates (indt), InDesign documents (indd), and indesign backward compatible markup files files (idml), (an InDesign book will not be much use opening unless you have the refferenced indd files).

       

      Try creating a new document and use File > Place… to place the content from your Zip 100 (it cannot be in a compressed folder like ZIP, RAR or SIT,  if so it must first be expanded/extracted) 

      Brad @ Roaring Mouse
      Community Expert
      Brad @ Roaring MouseCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      July 16, 2021

      There is no ZIP drive that will work on anything Mac Catalina (10.15) or newer due to the fact Apple has dropped support for the old HFS files system that they relied on. However, if you do have a ZIP drive which can connect via USB, and have access to a Mac 10.14 (Mojave) or older, it should technically mount and you can copy files over.

      EDIT: Apparenly there was a short time near the end of Iomega's tenure where you could format ZIP disks in HFS+ format. Those will mount on Catalina (I just tested and confirmed with a ZIP250 drive). Not sure about Big Sur. Still out of luck with HFS disks, tho.

        Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
        Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
        Legend
        July 17, 2021

        My studio is dual platform (Mac and Windows) and we're able to open a USB-powered Zip drive on a Windows 10 workstation, and copy Mac files to our Mac computers via our file server/NAS.

         

        The problems start when trying to open old file formats on newer Mac operating systems. An old PageMaker or Quark file is going to be tough to open, but an old Photoshop or Illustrator file is more likely to work.

         

        |    Bevi Chagnon   |  Designer, Trainer, & Technologist for Accessible Documents ||    PubCom |    Classes & Books for Accessible InDesign, PDFs & MS Office |
          Brad @ Roaring Mouse
          Community Expert
          Brad @ Roaring MouseCommunity Expert
          Community Expert
          July 18, 2021

          I'm surprised the ZIP on a Win 10 machine would see Mac formatted ZIPs.. Good to know.

          I pulled out an old ZIP 250 drive to test yesterday, and as I suspected, it would not read any of my old HFS-formatted disks on my Catalina-based iMac. The disk would show up in Disk Utility, but as suspected, would not mount. However, it would mount the HFS+ formatted ones (of which I have only a few as iomega only added the HFS+ standard toward the "end") but they went berserk as spotlight tried to index them, so it wasn't a fun time, but reading and writing was totally possible.

          (I also tested it on two older laptops: one running El Capitan and the other High Sierra. Both could read and write the HFS+ disks, but could only mount the HFS disks as read-only (which, I learned through a search, is the case with anything past Leopard as Apple had removed the ability to WRITE to HFS disks around then!)

          BobLevine
          Community Expert
          BobLevineCommunity Expert
          Community Expert
          July 16, 2021
          Zip archives absolutely must be unzipped first.
          D
          defaultehwmw5o5armdAuthor
          Known Participant
          July 16, 2021
          Hello...thank you....do you know what program I would use to unzip a Mac zip 100?
          Peter Spier
          Community Expert
          Peter SpierCommunity Expert
          Community Expert
          July 16, 2021

          Zip disks are not the same thing as zip archive files. If you really have a mac zip disk you'll need to find a zip drive and some old hardware that can interface with it. Zip disks are akin to huge floppy disks and have been obsolete for about twenty years.

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