tar.md

tar: File-Archive Tool

tar was originally designed for archiving files to tape. It is still useful however in moving entire directory structures between systems.

The format of the tar command is:

tar options directory

Tar unlike most Unix commands does not require the - before the options. Here are some your instructor uses frequently.

• c : Create an archive
• x : Extract files from an archive
• p : Attempt to save file permission and ownership information
• v : Verbose mode
• t : Test the archive
• f : Use a tar file
• z : compress the file using (gzip(1))

As an example let's create a tar file of everything under ~/Desktop.

cd ~
tar cvpf /tmp/command_line_curriculum.tar ~/command_line_curriculum/

This file can then be shared and untarred with

tar xvpf /tmp/command_line_curriculum.tar 

on another computer and have the same contents.