wtf is xtractr?

xtractr is a Go library that helps developers extract compressed archive files like ZIP, RAR, 7-Zip, and others. Instead of writing separate logic to handle each different archive format, a developer can use this tool to decompress and unpack many types of files through one consistent interface. It can also handle password-protected RAR and 7-Zip archives. The library offers two ways to work. A developer can extract a single file on demand by simply pointing the tool at an archive and specifying where to put the contents. Alternatively, they can set up a queue that processes multiple extractions in order, which is useful when an application receives many archive files at once. The queue processes items one at a time by default, and it notifies the application when each extraction starts and finishes. This tool would be useful for developers building applications that receive or download compressed files and need to unpack them automatically. For example, a file-sharing service, a backup tool, or a media manager that downloads and organizes content could benefit from this. Rather than dealing with the details of each archive format individually, the developer gets a single straightforward way to handle them all. A notable design choice is that the library does not implement the decompression logic itself. Instead, it acts as a wrapper that coordinates several existing specialized libraries, one per format. It also avoids requiring Cgo, a tool that links Go code with C code, which means the library runs cleanly on Linux, Windows, FreeBSD, and macOS across both 32-bit and 64-bit systems without extra dependencies or compilation headaches.