WTF *Nix

NAME

tar – The GNU version of the tar archiving utility

SYNOPSIS

tar  [ - ] A –catenate –concatenate | c –create | d –diff –compare
| –delete | r –append | t –list | u –update | x –extract  –get  [
options ] pathname [ pathname ... ]

DESCRIPTION

This  manual  page documents the GNU version of tar , an archiving pro-
gram designed to store and extract files from an archive file known  as
a  tarfile.  A tarfile may be made on a tape drive, however, it is also
common to write a tarfile to a normal file.  The first argument to  tar
must  be  one  of  the options: Acdrtux, followed by any optional func-
tions.  The final arguments to tar are the names of the files or direc-
tories  which  should  be  archived. The use of a directory name always
implies that  the  subdirectories  below  should  be  included  in  the
archive.

EXAMPLES

tar -xvvf foo.tar
extract foo.tar

tar -xvvzf foo.tar.gz
extract gzipped foo.tar.gz

tar -cvvf foo.tar foo/
tar contents of folder foo in foo.tar

FUNCTION LETTERS

One of the following options must be used:

-A, –catenate, –concatenate
append tar files to an archive

-c, –create
create a new archive

-d, –diff, –compare
find differences between archive and file system

–delete
delete from the archive (not for use on mag tapes!)

-r, –append
append files to the end of an archive

-t, –list
list the contents of an archive

-u, –update
only append files that are newer than copy in archive

-x, –extract, –get
extract files from an archive

OTHER OPTIONS

–anchored
force exclusion patterns to match initial subsequences

–atime-preserve
don’t change access times on dumped files

-b, –blocking-factor N
use record size of Nx512 bytes (default N=20)

-B, –read-full-records
reblock as we read (for reading 4.2BSD pipes)

–backup [TYPE]
back  up    files instead of overwriting (TYPE=numbered, existing,
simple)

-C, –directory DIR
change to directory DIR

–checkpoint
print periodic checkpoints

–exclude=PATTERN
exclude files matching PATTERN

-f, –file [HOSTNAME:]F
use archive file or device F (default “-”, meaning stdin/stdout)

-F, –info-script F, –new-volume-script F
run script at end of each tape (implies -M)

–force-local
archive file is local even if it has a colon

-G, –incremental
create/list/extract old GNU-format incremental backup

-g, –listed-incremental F
create/list/extract new GNU-format incremental backup

–group G
set group to G while adding files

-h, –dereference
don’t dump symlinks; dump the files they point to

–help print help message

-i, –ignore-zeros
ignore blocks of zeros in archive (normally mean EOF)

–ignore-case
ignore case when excluding files

–ignore-failed-read
don’t exit with non-zero status on unreadable files

-j, –bzip2
filter  archive  through    bzip2,    use  to decompress .bz2 files.
WARNING: some previous versions of tar used option -I to    filter
through  bzip2.  When writing scripts, use –bzip2 instead of -j
so that both older and newer tar versions will work.

-k, –keep-old-files
keep existing files; don’t overwrite them from archive

-K, –starting-file F
begin at file F in the archive

-l, –one-file-system
stay in local file system when creating an archive

-L, –tape-length N
change tapes after writing N*1024 bytes

-m, –touch
don’t extract file modified time

-M, –multi-volume
create/list/extract multi-volume archive

–mode M
set permissions to M while adding files

-N, –after-date DATE, –newer DATE
only store files newer than DATE

–newer-mtime DATE
only store files whose contents have changed after DATE

–no-anchored
allow exclusion patterns to match any substring (the default)

–no-ignore-case
match patterns case sensitively (the default)

–no-recursion
do not recurse into subdirectories

–no-same-owner
extract files with owner set to current user  (the  default  for
non-root users)

–no-same-permissions
apply umask to extracted files (the default for non-root users)

–no-wildcards
do not use wildcards when excluding files

–no-wildcards-match-slash
don’t let wildcards match “/” when excluding files

–null for -T, use “NUL” instead of newline as filename terminator

–numeric-owner
always use numbers for user/group names

-o, –old-archive, –portability
write a V7 format archive, rather than ANSI format

–owner O
set owner to O while adding files

-O, –to-stdout
extract files to standard output

-p, –same-permissions, –preserve-permissions
ignore umask when extracting files (the default for root)

-P, –absolute-names
don’t strip leading `/’s from file names

–posix
create POSIX compliant archive

–preserve
like -p -s

-R, –block-number
show block number within archive with each message

–record-size SIZE
use SIZE bytes per record

–recursion
recurse into directories (the default)

–recursive-unlink
remove existing directories before extracting directories of the
same name

–remove-files
remove files after adding them to the archive

–rsh-command=CMD
Use remote COMMAND instead of `rsh’.  This option exists so that
people  who use something other than the standard `rsh’ (e.g., a
Kerberized `rsh’) can access a remote device.

-S, –sparse
handle sparse files efficiently

-s, –same-order, –preserve-order
list of names to extract is sorted to match archive

–same-owner
extract files with owner as specified in    archive  (the  default
for root)

–show-omitted-dirs
mention directories that are being skipped over

–suffix SUFFIX
append SUFFIX to make backup files (default ~)

-T, –files-from F
get names to extract or archive from file F

–totals
display total bytes written after creating an archive

-U, –unlink-first
unlink & recreate files instead of overwriting

–use-compress-program PROG
filter the archive through PROG (which must accept -d)

-v, –verbose
verbosely list files processed

-V, –label NAME
create archive with volume name NAME

–version
print tar program version number

–volno-file F
keep track of current volume (of a multi-volume archive) in F

-w, –interactive, –confirmation
ask for confirmation for every action

-W, –verify
attempt to verify the archive after writing it

–wildcards
use wildcards when excluding files (the default)

–wildcards-match-slash
allow wildcards to match “/” (the default)

-X, –exclude-from=FILE
exclude files matching patterns listed in FILE

-Z, –compress, –uncompress
filter the archive through compress

-z, –gzip, –gunzip, –ungzip
filter the archive through gzip

-[0-7][lmh]
specify drive and density