What is wrong with "compress" option? In finder, I can cntrl + click on a file and click "compress"... Sometimes. It seems that randomly the option just won't show up and I have to open a new finder window, or duplicate the folder first, or something ridiculous like that.

Is this a bug, or is compress only supposed to show up under certain circumstances?
This might help:

Apple discussions

It says that you can't compress certain folders like smart folders that are created in the 'All My Files' and 'Recents' box.