Tradional Usage
tar {A|c|d|r|t|u|x}[GnSkUWOmpsMBiajJzZhPlRvwo] [ARG...]
It is invigorating.
Talk to me when you ffmpeg by heart π
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eXtract Ze Vucking File
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I was going to use this opportunity to shill for tldr by linking directly to their page on tar.
But I just realized tar's reputation is so bad, they use it as the example on tldr's homepage. π
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Again this old myth that using tar is possible without looking up commands every time. It's been debunked many times
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I saw tar -xvf 13 years ago and have been using it ever since.
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for me itβs remembering whether I wanted addgroup or groupadd
Tar (some versions at least?) is actually smart enough to detect which format to use based on file extension of the output, so you don't need to remember which flag corresponds to which compressor. Examples:
tar -caf archive.tar.xz [files]
tar -caf archive.tar.bz2 [files]
# extract
tar -xf archive.tar.xz
tar -xf archive.tar.bz2
So you really only need to remember that c means create, x means extract
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I once had a job where I used tar multiple times a day for years. I don't think I could forget how to use it if I wanted to, which I don't because I still use it.
It's pretty simple
tar
e[x]tract
[z]is
[f]ile
[v]erbosely
archive.tar.gz
--directory=archivedir
For creation it's pretty much the same but you need to specify [c]reate, e.g. tar czvf archive.tar.gz filestoarchive/ and for lis[t]ing it's - tar tf archive.tar.gz
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tar -xvf all the things!
It's easy, you just have to remember the development was from Transylvania.
EXtract Ze Vamn Files
Why is everyone always going in about tar? I never saw the issue with it, its not more or less complicated than other commands that take command line flags...
For example: sudo netstat -peanut, where -peanut actually expands to -p -e -a -n -u -t. I don't have any idea anymore what each letter stands for while I do recall that tar -cjf file.tar * is -c create, -j bzip2 compression and -f filename
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zxf and zcf for me, I know what they do but not what it means. It's been like 30 years at this point
This is output on my setup (I frequently forget that I did this):
$ tarhelp
helper definitions for tarcomp, untar, and tarls / tarlist:
- tar[comp] -czvf archive.tar.gz file1 file2 dir1 file3
- [un]tar -xvf archive.tar.gz
- tar[ls|list] -tvf archive.tar.gz
A clever helper, I think. If I remember to use it.
I still remember moment when I accidentally swapped tar's arguments and it just overwrited my 20 Gib directory with empty tarball. (I had backups luckily.)
I can do that since 2005 when I installed gentoo for the first time.
Same but with math: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Feeling_of_Power
Read here (PDF): https://archive.org/download/TheFeelingOfPower/The%20Feeling%20of%20Power.pdf
true and real
Oh man so true
I only look at the tar manpage after xzf fails
Running a tar command without googling it.
rsync over ssh
more ~/.zsh_history | grep tar
highlight
copy
paste
move cursor to change file
am i doing it right
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tar is chill as fuck. Try messing with zip and unzip. Fuck zip.
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Tar used to be more complicated, some of the flags are not necessary anymore but I still create .tbz2 with cvjf and extract with xvzf.
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