The name Alternate Archiver may mislead you. This is because it is not an archiving tool in the strict sense (like 7-Zip), but a program that allows you to bring order to your file chaos by placing files in subfolders, or by batch renaming them. You can also split, move and delete with it. In short, an all-round file manager.
Alternative Archiver
Price
For free
Language
English
OS
Windows (all versions)
Website
www.tiny.cc/altarch 8 Score 80 
- Pros
- Various useful functions
- Preview
- User friendly
- Negatives
- No ‘real’ archive function (like zip, …)
During the installation of Alternate Archiver you will be given the opportunity to create a shortcut in the context menu of Windows Place explorer. Handy, because you can quickly send folders and files to this tool. This can also be done by dragging files to the program window or by retrieving them from within the program itself.
Archivist
Let’s start our exploration with the ‘archiving function’. As soon as you have added data, you can in principle place it in an archive file with the push of a button. By default, this is a simple copy or move operation, unless you select one of the options that allows you to automatically rearrange the files in various subfolders, based on date, name or type. For example, if you opt for a reordering based on date, this can be done according to year, month, day, hour, minute or even second. A handy preview immediately shows what result you can expect.
rename
Organizing files by moving them into logical subfolders is one way to avoid chaos, but renaming the files themselves is another. Here, too, you can have this done on the basis of various criteria – at the same time.
For example, you can have files numbered, including filler characters, or you can have the date or the old file name or folder name included. You also choose the order of these name elements yourself. In addition, on separate tabs you can customize the extension, remove or replace characters, and control capital and small letters. A preview also shows you whether everything looks good here.
Additional tools
In addition to ‘archiving’ and renaming, Alternate Archiver contains a few other tools to better keep your data in line. For example, you can change the file dates in batch, there is a file shredder, you can split or merge files automatically and there are also more ‘esoteric’ tools such as a dll analyzer and an exe packer.
