[okular] [Bug 486856] New: Open CBR rely in external apps, but in Windows are outdated or trial / closed source (Use 7-zip instead there?)

[Lukas ThyWalls]

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=486856

            Bug ID: 486856
           Summary: Open CBR rely in external apps, but in Windows are
                    outdated or trial / closed source (Use 7-zip instead
                    there?)
    Classification: Applications
           Product: okular
           Version: 24.04.80
          Platform: Microsoft Windows
                OS: Microsoft Windows
            Status: REPORTED
          Severity: wishlist
          Priority: NOR
         Component: Comicbook backend
          Assignee: okular-devel at kde.org
          Reporter: thywalls at gmail.com
  Target Milestone: ---

SUMMARY

I think this is a common issue talked here in other platforms
https://bugs.kde.org/buglist.cgi?bug_status=UNCONFIRMED&bug_status=CONFIRMED&bug_status=ASSIGNED&bug_status=REOPENED&bug_status=RESOLVED&bug_status=NEEDSINFO&bug_status=VERIFIED&bug_status=CLOSED&component=Comicbook%20backend&list_id=2709189&product=okular&query_format=advanced&short_desc=CBR&short_desc_type=allwordssubstr,
but in Windows the issue still is there somehow.

Summarizing, actually if you want to open a CBR file in Okular, it needs Unrar
or The Unarchiver (since https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=339370).

However, for Windows:
- The Unarchiver https://theunarchiver.com/ is a Mac app, closed source, and
their CLI tool (Unar https://theunarchiver.com/command-line) for Windows is
outdated, and I don't know if only with it works or not because I didn't try.
- The only Windows / Free / Open source Unrar i found is from GnuWin32
https://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/unrar.htm which is almost 20 years
old. The other Windows one is RARLAB Unrar what comes bundled with WinRAR,
which is Trial / Closed Source https://www.win-rar.com/download.html
https://www.rarlab.com/download.htm.

So, in Windows, you rely solely on outdated versions or closed source / trial
software.

STEPS TO REPRODUCE

1. In Windows,
2. with Okular 24.04.80,
3. without Unar (Unarchiver Cli Tool), Unrar Free or WinRAR installed,
4. try to open any CBR file.

OBSERVED RESULT

> Could not open file:///E:/ComicBook.cbr. 
> Cannot open document, neither unrar nor unarchiver were found.

EXPECTED RESULT

Open it?

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS

- Windows 10 PRO 22H2
- Okular 24.04.80

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

- For Windows, maybe it's more common a reliable to use https://7-zip.org/ as
it has a 7z.exe command line tool that supports RAR.

- As it seems Okular uses KArchive, I could test that it reads without anything
else CBZ (Zip) and also CB7 (7-zip)
https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=412413, and It should be doing also CBT
(Tar) https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=204195. 

- Much better solution could be add a backend option which show a few default
and autodetected built-in options (Unrar, Unar, 7z...) and maybe a custom
option to put a path and command line tool of your preference to deal with the
extraction.

---

Thanks!

PD.: CBR (RAR), CBA (ACE) and other based in closed format are awful...

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