GNU tar: an archiver tool (*DRAFT*)

For version 1.11.8, June 1995

• Introduction
  • What tar Does
  • GNU tar Authors
  • Reporting bugs or suggestions
  • Support considerations
    • Stability of GNU tar
    • Should we rewrite the thing?
    • Why maintaining it?
    • MSDOS and other systems?
• Tutorial Introduction to tar
  • How to Create Archives
    • Creating Archives of Files
    • Using tar in Verbose Mode
    • How to Archive Directories
    • Creating an Archive from the Superior Directory
    • Comparing Files in an Archive with Files in the File System
    • Using Compare from the Superior Directory
  • How to List Archives
    • Listing the Contents of an Archive
    • Getting Additional File Information
    • List A Specific File in an Archive
    • Listing the Contents of a Stored Directory
  • How to Extract Members from an Archive
    • Extract Files from an Archive into Your Current Directory
    • Extracting Files from an Archive
    • Extracting Specific Files
    • Extracting Directories
  • How to Add Files to Existing Archives
    • Appending Files to an Archive
    • Updating Files in an Archive
    • Concatenating Archives
  • How to Delete Members from Archives
• Invoking GNU tar
  • General Synopsis of tar
  • Many Styles for Options
    • Mnemonic Option Style
    • Short Option Style
    • Old Option Style
    • Mixing Option Styles
  • All Available Options
    • Device selection and switching
    • Device blocking
    • Old classification of options
• Basic tar Operations
  • Creating a New Archive
  • Adding to an Existing Archive
  • Updating an Archive
  • Combining Archives
  • Removing Archive Members
  • Listing Archive Members
  • Extracting Archive Members
    • Options to Help Read Archives
    • Changing How tar Writes Files
    • Recovering From Scarce Disk Space
  • Comparing Archives Members with Files
  • Matching the Format Parameters
• Specifying Names to tar
  • Changing the Archive Name
  • Selecting Files by Characteristic
    • Reading Names from a File
    • Excluding Some Files
    • Operating Only on New Files
    • Crossing Filesystem Boundaries
  • Local file selection
    • Changing Directory
    • Absolute File Names
• Being Even More Careful
  • GNU tar documentation
  • Checking tar progress
  • Asking for Confirmation During Operations
  • Verifying Data as It is Stored
  • Comparing an Archive with the File System
  • Making tar Archives More Portable
    • Portable Names
    • Symbolic Links
    • Old V7 and POSIX Archives
    • Checksumming Problems
  • Write Protection
• Controlling the Archive Format
  • Handling of file attributes
  • Archive format selection
  • Using Less Space through Compression
    • Creating and Reading Compressed Archives
    • Dealing with Compressed Archives
    • Archiving Sparse Files
  • Special Options for Archiving
  • The Structure of an Archive
  • Operation mode modifiers
• Tapes and Other Archive Media
  • Device selection and switching
  • Blocking
    • Format Variations
    • The Blocking Factor of an Archive
  • Many archives on one tape
    • Tape Positions and Tape Marks
    • The mt Utility
  • Using Multiple Tapes
    • Archives Longer than One Tape or Disk
    • Tape Files
  • Including a Label in the Archive
• Performing Backups and Restoring Files
  • Using tar to Perform Full Dumps
  • Using tar to Perform Incremental Dumps
  • The Incremental Options
  • Levels of Backups
  • Setting Parameters for Backups and Restoration
    • An Example Text of `Backup-specs'
    • Syntax for `Backup-specs'
  • Using the Backup Scripts
  • Using the Restore Script
• Date input formats
  • General date syntax
  • Calendar date item
  • Time of day item
  • Timezone item
  • Day of week item
  • Relative item in date strings
  • Pure numbers in date strings
  • Authors of getdate
• Format of tar archives
  • The Standard Format
  • GNU Extensions to the Archive Format
  • Comparison of tar and cpio
• Index