What does "Save new documents as packages" mean?

The native document format for Pages 09 is a package, which is a folder set to be treated as a file by the Finder and elsewhere. When that checkbox is off, Pages zips the packages while saving them; this reduces the amount of space the documents use on the drive and allows them to be attached directly, but makes it harder to extract document content manually, which is only useful in recovering the content of damaged documents.

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Hi Niel,

In addition to your explanation, I would like to know:

1. for general day to day use by an occasional user, what is the best option, to check or not to check the "Save new documents as packages" ?
2. As well, for myself that provides Mac presentations and uploads .pages to an internet server for distribution to members, which option should I use?
3. Then again, if saving to iCloud, which option is best?
4. Which option creates the greater file size?
5. Could you define zips in your sentence : «When that checkbox is off, Pages zips the packages while saving them;». Does that mean "removes" and what is actually saved in «saving them» ?

I would appreciate your assistance in explaining this as I don't have a techical or programming background which I think would be needed to understanding as you indicated the "native document format".

I hope that you can help me with this.

Thank you in advance.

Jean-Paul