Tar /

Usage

tar is a classic UNIX ulitily to make archives out of directories and files. unlike most other archive formats, tape generally does not compress on it's own, but rather thru other programs such as gzip, bzip2, compress or xz.

Creating archives

To make an archive out of /bin directory:

$ tar cf bin.tar /bin

c means to create an archive
f is used to specify an tar file

You may also add v argument to print every file and directory that is being added to archive or extracted.

Creating compressed archives

You may compress the archives you make with tar on the fly, for example to compress with gzip(1):

$ tar czf bin.tgz /bin

Here we used .tgz extenstion instead of .tar since we are using a gzipped (gz) tar file. another common extentision for gzipped tar files is .tar.gz, but tgz is prefered for compatablity with older systems and partitions.

Extracting

To extract an archive:

$ tar xf bin.tar

If it's compressed with gzip(1):

$ tar xzf bin.tgz