If you use the Yaourt package installer on Arch Linux, you're probably aware of the long install times of certain large packages like android-ndk or chromium . The reason for this is the compression. The install process goes something like this:

Download package Build package with makepkg Download sources Build package Compress package into a .pkg.tar.xz archive Uncompress archive in order to install it Install package

Notice something? The step that takes by far the longest (compressing the package) is totally unnecessary because the package is uncompressed again in the next steps.

The archive extension is configurable though. Add the following line to your ~/.yaourtrc :

PKGEXT=.pkg.tar

The compression step should now take only a few instants, because the compression itself is being skipped.