Thread by @linuxopsys

When it comes to creating backups, packaging software source code for distribution, and managing files in Linux, the tar command is no doubt one of the widely used archiving utilities.

Learn more in this guide:

Tar command which is abbreviated as tape archive is used to group files into archives called tarballs and also compress files using popular compression algorithms such as gzip, bzip2, and xz.

Common Options

The picture below lists the most common options you can use with the tar command to perform different operations.

tar Command Operations

Now let's look at some common operations you can do with the tar command:

1. Create

The -c option can be used to combine multiple files into an archive called a tarball. Here is an example of creating archives using the tar command:

$ tar -cf archive.tar file1 file2

2. Compress

Compressing is different from creating an archive in the sense that archiving uses the same amount of disk space as all the individual files and directories combined, whilst compression reduces the size.

The option for compressing files depends on the type of algorithm you want to use. To create and compress an archive using gzip use the -z option:

$ tar -czf archive.tar.gz file1 file2

Tar offers a good option, -a, that intelligently determines the compression algorithm from the specified archive suffix or extension. Compressing an archive using the xz compression algorithm, for example, you would use:

$ tar -caf archive.tar.xz file1 file2

3. Extract

The -x option can be used for extracting or uncompressing archives. Here is an example of extracting an archive in the current working directory:

$ tar -xf archive.tar

If you want to extract an archive to a specific directory use the -C option followed by the directory where you want the files to be extracted:

$ tar -xf archive.tar -C directory-path

4. Concatenate

If you have two or more archives you can concatenate or combine them using the -A option:

$ tar -Af archive.tar archive2.tar

Tar command gives you the ability to add more files to an already existing archive without having to extract and archive the files again. To append files to an archive use the -a option or -r option:

$ tar -rf archive.tar file_to_append
$ tar -af archive.tar file_to_append

5. List

The -T option can be used to list the contents of an archive. This option is very handy if you just want to have a peek at a large archive without extracting it:

tar -tf archive.tar

Summing up!

This thread demonstrated how to use the tar command with practical examples and some of its available options that can help you to perfom different operations.

If you get stuck with this command, feel free to refer to the man pages or the command help menu.

That’s all!

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