Sep 24, 2009

How to create and extract .tar, .tar.bz2, .tar.gz files in command line

Here is how to use GNU Tar to create tarballs and extract files in command line:

To create tarball use: c switch (create), f switch (file), j switch (for bzip2 files .bz2) and z switch (for gnu zip files .gz)

Here are some examples on creating tar, gz and bz2 files:
To create tar file:
$ tar cf file.tar file

To create .gz file:
$ tar czf file.tar.gz file

To create bz2 file:
$ tar cjf file.tar.bz2 file

To extract files use: x switch (extract), f switch (file), j switch (for bzip2 files .bz2) and z switch (for gnu zip files .gz), optional is v switch (verbose - will show output during extraction) or vv (very verbose - will show detailed output during extraction)

Now some examples on how to extract tar, gz and bz2 files:

To extract gz file use:
$ tar xzf file.tar.gz

To extract bz2 file use:
$ tar xjf file.tar.bz2

Funny thing is, that nowdays all three types of files can be extracted quick just by typing:
$ tar xf file.tar
$ tar xjf file.tar.bz2
$ tar xzf file.tar.gz

Verbose output during extraction:
$ tar xvjf file.tar.bz2
file
$

Very verbose output:
$ tar xvvjf file.tar.bz2
-rw-r--r-- baban/baban 5 2009-09-24 15:00 file
$

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