Lzip is able to read from some types of non regular files if the "-stdout" option is specified.If no file names are specified, lzip compresses (or decompresses) from standard input to standard output. Each compressed file has the same modification date, permissions, and, when possible, ownership as the corresponding original, so that these properties can be correctly restored at decompression time. If the cause of file corruption is damaged media, the combination GNU ddrescue + lziprecover is the best option for recovering data from multiple damaged copies.Lzip replaces every file given in the command line with a compressed version of itself, with the name "original_name.lz".
Software tools that decompress both formats or can convert lzma-alone files to lzip format are listed below, in the Links section.Lziprecover is a data recovery tool for lzip compressed files able to repair slightly damaged files, recover badly damaged files from two or more copies, and extract undamaged members from multi-member files.
Lzip decompresses almost as fast as gzip and compresses better than bzip2, which makes it well suited for software distribution and data archiving.Here you can find some tests showing how well lzip can replace gzip and bzip2 for software distribution and data archiving.The lzip file format (.lz) is an improved successor of the unsafe and deprecated lzma-alone file format (.lzma).
Lzip is a lossless data compressor based on the LZMA algorithm, with very safe integrity checking and a user interface similar to the one of gzip or bzip2.