If your computer is slowing as it gets overloaded with data, the best thing to do is create zip files that can compress the size of many files, storing all the data in one place and occupying less space on your Mac. Probably not the most effective way to do what you're asking but aespipe is a versatile tool so I thought it was worth mentioning.Our computers get cluttered with dozens of documents from work, hundreds of pictures from friends, spreadsheets packed with personal information, health forms, financial paperwork, and on it goes. Since the output goes to stdout you'll have to redirect it to a file with a name of your own choosing. It doesn't support compression, so you can pipe the input through gzip first. $ cat clear_text.gz.aes | aespipe -d | gunzip > clear_text #Decrypt & DecompressĪespipe is what it sounds like, a program that takes input on stdin and outputs aes encrypted data on stdout. Using gzip and aespipe $ cat clear_text | gzip | aespipe > clear_text.gz.aes #Compress & Encrypt The output file is called clear_text.bfe by default. $ bcrypt -r clear_text.bfe #Decrypt & Decompressīcrypt compresses before encrypting by default, the -r option is so that the input file isn't deleted in the process. Using bcrypt $ bcrypt -r clear_text #Compress & Encrypt By default this outputs a file called clear_text.gz.nc. $ mdecrypt -z clear_text.gz.nc #Decrypt & Decompress Using mcrypt $ mcrypt -z clear_text #Compress & Encrypt One benefit of using gpg is that is uses standard OpenPGP formats, so any encryption software that supports OpenPGP will be able to decrypt it. Gpg will compress the input file before encryption by default, -c means to use symmetric encryption with a password.

$ gpg -d clear_text.gpg #Decrypt & Decompress Using gpg $ gpg -c clear_text #Compress & Encrypt These examples compress and encrypt a file called clear_text.

One thing to note is that if you're going to use separate compression and encryption tools you should always compress before encryption, since encrypted data is essentially non-compressible.

Linux zip with password