In computing, Lhasa (Japanese pronunciation: [ɾasa]) refers to two different applications.
Lhasa is Japanese computer program used for unpacking or decompressing files in various compressed formats, including LHA and ZIP. Lhasa is an open-source utility specifically designed for handling LZH (LHA) compression, which was a common format for archiving files in early computer systems.
The development of Lhasa likely began in the early days of computing when the LHA compression format gained popularity. The LHA format, also known as LZH, was widely used in the 1980s and 1990s for archiving files on systems like the Amiga and early versions of Microsoft Windows.
It is also the name of a computer program developed[when?] in the research group of Elias James Corey at the Harvard University Department of Chemistry which uses AI techniques to discover sequences of reactions which may be used to synthesize a compound. LHASA in this case is an acronym for Logic and Heuristics Applied to Synthetic Analysis. This program was one of the first to use a graphical interface to input and display chemical structures.