Work with archives
Open an archive from Files → file menu → Browse archive, or browse an accessible archive on its share page. Flare can inspect ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ/TGZ, and GZIP files without first adding their contents to a library. Share-page visitors can preview and download individual entries. In your own library, you can also extract contents into a new folder or create a ZIP or TAR.GZ from files you own.
Share-page browsing follows the archive file's visibility and password rules. An unprotected public archive can be browsed while signed out. A protected public archive requires its file password; knowing a private file's password does not make it public. Owners with files.read and accounts with content.read retain their usual privileged file access. Named API tokens do not grant archive access.
Creation and extraction remain owner-only library operations requiring a signed-in browser. Share pages provide browsing and downloads, including for signed-in recipients; they do not extract another person's archive into your account.
| Action | Required permissions |
|---|---|
| Browse a share page or download an entry | Access to the file under its visibility/password rules |
| Browse an archive in your own library | files.read |
| Create an archive from owned files | files.read and files.upload; also folders.manage when saving into a folder |
| Extract into a new folder | files.read, files.upload, and folders.manage |
Existing files and links stay unchanged. Private (no profile) is the default for extraction and creation: new files are private, with no file password or expiration. Your account's default upload profile is not selected automatically. You can explicitly choose an owned Upload profile to apply its sharing, tags, expiration, naming, and share-page settings. Review the summary before confirming: a public profile can make new outputs public. Original files' Flare passwords and visibility are not copied into the result.
Archive activity can appear in the administrator's audit log, including archive filenames, selected member paths, outcomes, and the acting account when available. File passwords and entry contents are not recorded as audit metadata. Making an archive private or deleting it does not remove its existing audit history.
The screenshots below show real operations with disposable demonstration files. Watch the recorded library workflows and shared browsing, or reproduce them locally.
Browse and save one entry
- Upload a supported archive, or find one already in Files.
- Open its menu and choose Browse archive. The same action is available among the card's preview actions.
- Open folders and use the breadcrumbs to return toward Archive root. Search archive finds entries by their paths.
- Select a file to inspect its preview. Use Download entry to save that member to your device.
Browsing and downloading an entry do not create new library files or folders. Text previews are limited to 256 KiB, and image previews to 10 MiB; use the download action for larger entries or unsupported preview types. HTML and SVG are displayed as text rather than active documents. An archive is inspected as a whole before it is accepted: Flare does not silently skip an unsafe entry and show a partial archive.
In both library and share-page browsers, Download entry waits while a supported preview loads or retries, so the two requests do not overlap. Entries without a supported preview can be downloaded immediately.
See an image entry preview
Flare file passwords and archive encryption are different. A normal Flare file password controls access to the share page and entries. Encrypted archive contents remain unsupported after unlocking that page; remove the archive's encryption in an appropriate local tool before uploading a copy you intend to inspect.
Browse an archive shared with you
- Open the normal Flare share link. If the public archive is protected, enter File password and choose Access File.
- Under Archive contents, open folders or use Search archive to find member paths. Archive root returns to the top level.
- Select an entry to preview supported text or an image, then choose Download entry to save that file. The share page remains open.
- Use the ordinary Download action below the viewer if you want the complete archive.
These actions do not add files to an account or expose other files in the owner's library. Share-page browsing is inline; it has no Extract all action, including when the owner is signed in. To extract into Flare, the owner uses Files → Browse archive → Extract all in their own library. Entry paths and filenames remain visible to authorized viewers even when the outer share-page filename is hidden by a presentation setting.
See shared text and image previews
Each shared archive request checks the current file access rules. Making the archive private, changing its password, or deleting it affects subsequent requests; content already previewed or downloaded cannot be recalled. Expiration follows the normal scheduled expiry processing.
See the password gate and unlocked archive
If you arrived through a shared folder, that folder's link controls discovery of the file. Disabling the folder share or moving the file out blocks that entrypoint. An already-known canonical public file URL and its archive contents remain accessible under the file's own visibility/password rules. Change the file itself when you need to stop that public access.
Extract into your library
- In your own Files library, open Browse archive and choose Extract all. Share-page browsers do not offer extraction.
- Under Save to, choose an existing folder or Unfiled for the top level.
- Set New folder name for the wrapper that will contain the extracted items.
- Keep Private (no profile), or explicitly choose an Upload profile and review its visibility and expiration.
- Choose Extract files and wait for the result.
- Choose Open folder to review the new files and their subfolders.
The new wrapper preserves the archive's directory hierarchy. Its name follows the normal folder rules: up to 80 characters and distinct within the chosen parent. The operation does not overwrite existing files or replace the original archive. A failed operation does not publish a partial set of extracted files. Choose a distinct wrapper name if that destination already contains a folder with the same name.
Extracted files add to your storage usage while the original archive remains stored. Account quota and the instance's maximum file size still apply. Filename-based automatic tags, automatic OCR when enabled, and file.ready webhooks use the normal processing flow for the new files; OCR may finish after extraction completes. These are separate library files, so later edits to them do not change the source archive.
See the preserved folders and new library files
Create an archive from selected files
- In Files, choose Select and select the files to include.
- Choose Create archive.
- Set Archive name, choose ZIP or TAR.GZ under Format, and choose Save to.
- Keep Private (no profile), or explicitly choose an Upload profile. Check its visibility, expiration, and other settings before continuing.
- Choose Create archive and wait for completion.
- Use Open archive to inspect the result, or Open folder to see its destination.
Select visible files includes loaded cards currently on screen, not all matching results. Scroll to add files from another part of the library; selected files remain included when their cards leave the screen. Opening Create archive reloads the current names and sizes for the full selection. If the refresh fails, retry the action. If a selected file is no longer available, clear the selection with Done and choose the remaining files again.
Changing filters, folders, sorting, or grouping clears the selection, as does closing the archive dialog.
You can include up to 100 files from your account. The result is one new library file; the selected originals keep their locations, links, permissions, and contents. Creating an archive does not reclaim storage or create an instance backup.
Selected files are placed at the archive's root rather than recreating their library folders. Names are normalized for portable archive paths: path-like names are flattened and unsafe separators or punctuation are cleaned. Conflicting filenames receive a suffix such as report (2).pdf so each selected file remains represented. The output receives the chosen .zip or .tar.gz extension.
Archive creation does not encrypt the result or carry over each source file's Flare password, visibility, expiration, tags, or share link as archive access controls. Anyone who later obtains the archive bytes can read its contents with an archive tool. Keep the result private until you have reviewed everything it contains.
See a completed archive and its members
Choose an upload profile deliberately
An explicitly selected profile applies to every new extracted file, or to the single generated archive. Its destination remains controlled by Save to; the profile does not choose a folder. A public profile can expose all packaged contents through the new archive's public download, even when its source files were private.
The normal upload-profile permission rules still apply. Without files.share, outputs stay private. Applying profile tags needs tags.manage; an expiration that deletes files needs files.delete, and an expiration that makes them private needs files.share. A profile contains no file password. Flare checks that the profile and its inherited account/instance defaults still match the settings shown in the dialog. A profile edit, deletion, or relevant inherited-default or sharing-permission change before submission or during processing stops publication without adding outputs. The dialog refreshes the settings while retaining your choices; review them and submit again. Private (no profile) keeps its fixed defaults regardless of account changes.
Use archives on a phone
The same archive tools work in the mobile library. Scroll the dialog's fields when necessary; extraction actions remain below the scrolling content. Search, folder navigation, profile choices, and permissions work the same way.
On a share page, the entry list and preview stack vertically. Scroll to Download entry for the selected member or the ordinary Download action for the whole archive.
Supported sizes and formats
Limits apply to every request, including browsing. MiB means 1,048,576 bytes.
| Limit | Maximum |
|---|---|
| Source archive or generated archive | 256 MiB |
| One archive member or one selected source file | 256 MiB |
| Expanded contents, or combined files selected for creation | 512 MiB |
| Archive members, including parent directories | 1,000 |
| Files selected for creation | 100 |
| Archive path depth | 20 levels |
| Archive path length | 1,024 characters |
| Archive processing time | 120 seconds |
The instance's file-size limit and your remaining quota can impose lower limits when new files are created. Each Flare application process allows two concurrent archive operations. Owner-library work allows at most one per account; share-page work allows at most one per source file. Shared browsing and entry downloads also share a limit of 30 requests per IP per minute in each process. If the service is busy or a rate limit is reached, wait and retry.
After the initial header checks, Flare allows five seconds to read a share page's small browsing/download request body, before authorizing file access and starting archive processing. This submission limit is separate from the 120-second processing deadline; it does not require the whole archive to transfer in five seconds. If submission times out, retry on a stable connection. Incomplete or rejected requests do not reserve archive-processing capacity.
RAR, 7z, encrypted archives, and split archives are unsupported. Links, special filesystem entries, unsafe paths, conflicting paths, malformed contents, and archives exceeding the limits are rejected. Flare does not execute extracted programs or restore archive filesystem permissions.
Troubleshoot an operation
When Files detects an account change or replacement sign-in, it closes the previous account's archive dialogs and clears the selection. An archive operation already accepted by the server can still finish. Sign back in to the original account and check its destination before retrying, so you do not create duplicate output.
| What you see | What to do |
|---|---|
| No archive action | Check the format and entrypoint. Library tools require files.read; share-page browsing requires access to the file. |
| Unsupported, unsafe, or malformed archive | Recreate it as a regular ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ/TGZ, or GZIP with ordinary files and directories. Remove encryption, links, and conflicting paths first. |
| An entry has no preview | Download it and open it locally; preview limits and browser format support are separate from archive support. |
| Extraction or creation is unavailable | These are owner-library operations; share pages offer browsing and downloads only. Check upload/folder permissions for your own files. |
| Destination or wrapper name rejected | Pick an existing folder you own and a distinct new wrapper name, then retry. |
| Size, quota, or time limit reached | Split the work into smaller archives or selections, or extract locally and upload the files you need. Raising an upload setting does not raise the fixed archive limits. |
| Another operation is running | Finish the current archive request before starting another; the server also limits concurrent operations across accounts. |
For contributors, the archive API describes exact requests and responses. Operators can review archive resource requirements.