Commands using tar (226)

  • Find (by regular expression) and compress (xzip) catalogs then remove source catalogs


    0
    find . -type d |awk '$1 ~ /[0-9]/ {print $0}' |xargs -P 4 -I NAME tar --remove-files -vcJf NAME.tar.xz NAME
    Glafir · 2017-08-28 08:05:29 19
  • untar in place with out creating a temporary file


    0
    ssh user@host "tar -zcf - /path/to/dir" | tar -xvz
    sandeep048 · 2017-10-07 11:37:51 18
  • I use screenflow to create and edit videos. The default storage for a single video is a folder. If I want to move that someplace, it's easier to zip up the folder and send it. If I'm making a series of short videos, I might have 10 folders. This will go through and make a single bz3 file for EACH folder.


    0
    for f in *screenflow ; do tar cvf "$f.tar.bz2" "$f"; done
    topher1kenobe · 2020-08-02 21:10:27 161
  • This is a little bash script that will take all files following the *gz pattern in the directory and apply the tar -zxvf command to them.


    -1
    for i in *.tar.gz *.tgz; do tar -zxvf $i; done
    bohemicus · 2009-02-18 10:58:12 8
  • Add z to the flags to enable compression.


    -1
    tar cf - . | (cd /new/dir; tar xvf -)
    jauderho · 2009-03-09 20:30:34 12
  • gpg's compression is as suitable as gzip's however your backups can now be encrypted. to extract use: gpg < folder.tpg | tar -xf -


    -1
    tar -cf - folder/ | gpg -c > folder.tpg
    copremesis · 2009-05-08 19:20:08 5

  • -1
    tar -C <source> -cf - . | tar -C <destination> -xf -
    Tekhne · 2009-07-10 21:16:23 4
  • Tar - Compress by excluding folders Show Sample Output


    -1
    tar -cvf /path/dir.tar /path/dir* --exclude "/path/dir/name" --exclude "/path/dir/opt"
    sandeepverma · 2009-12-15 09:48:41 3
  • Combines a few repetitive tasks when compiling source code. Especially useful when a hypen in a file-name breaks tab completion. 1.) wget source.tar.gz 2.) tar xzvf source.tar.gz 3.) cd source 4.) ls From there you can run ./configure, make and etc. Show Sample Output


    -1
    wtzc () { wget "$@"; foo=`echo "$@" | sed 's:.*/::'`; tar xzvf $foo; blah=`echo $foo | sed 's:,*/::'`; bar=`echo $blah | sed -e 's/\(.*\)\..*/\1/' -e 's/\(.*\)\..*/\1/'`; cd $bar; ls; }
    oshazard · 2010-01-17 11:25:47 3
  • You don't need to create an intermediate file, just pipe the output directly to tar command and use stin as file (put a dash after the f flag).


    -1
    cat 1.tar.gz 2.tar.gz | tar zxvif -
    psychopenguin · 2010-05-09 03:50:00 5
  • Using the COPYFILE_DISABLE=true environment variable you can prevent tar from adding any ._-files to your .tar-file on Mac OS X.


    -1
    COPYFILE_DISABLE=true tar cvf newTarFile.tar Directory/
    alainkaa · 2010-07-01 09:36:48 3

  • -1
    pbzip2 -dck <bz2file> | tar xvf -
    maarten · 2010-08-16 22:16:50 3
  • The J option is a recent addition to GNU tar. The xz compression utility is required as well.


    -1
    tar cfJ tarfile.tar.xz pathnames
    jasonjgw · 2010-11-18 05:34:17 2
  • `tar xfzO` extracts to STDOUT which got redirected directly to mysql. Really helpful, when your hard drive can't fit two copies of non-compressed database :)


    -1
    tar xfzO <backup_name>.tar.gz | mysql -u root <database_name>
    alecnmk · 2011-02-10 22:18:42 5
  • Sometimes you might need to have two copies of data that is in tar. You might unpack, and then copy, but if IO is slow, you might lower it by automatically writing it twice (or more times)


    -1
    mkdir copy{1,2}; gzip -dc file.tar.gz | tee >( tar x -C copy1/ ) | tar x -C copy2/
    depesz · 2011-04-14 17:02:05 5
  • Simple Compressed Backup of the /etc Linux compatible


    -1
    tar jcpf /home/[usuario]/etc-$(hostname)-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S).tar.bz2 /etc
    mack · 2011-04-29 22:53:11 4
  • should do the same as command #12875, just shorter.


    -1
    tar -cf "../${PWD##*/}.tar" .
    joedhon · 2013-11-06 11:15:38 9
  • backup your files in tar archive + timestamp of backup Show Sample Output


    -1
    tar -cvf bind9-config-`date +%s`.tar *
    Fuonum · 2014-10-29 05:15:15 9
  • This is useful for sending data between 2 computers that you have shell access to. Uses tar compression during transfer. Files are compressed & uncompressed automatically. Note the trailing dash on the listening side that makes netcat listen to stdin for data. on the listening side: sudo nc -lp 2022 | sudo tar -xvf - explanation: open netcat to -l listen on -p port 2022, take the data stream and pipe to tar -x extract, -v verbose, -f using file filename - means "stdin" on the sending side: tar -cvzf - ./*| nc -w 3 name_of_listening_host 2022 explanation: compress all files in current dir using tar -c create, -v verbose, -f using file, - filename - here means "stdout" because we're tar -c instead of tar -x, -w3 wait 3 seconds on stream termination and then end the connection to the listening host name_of_listening_host, on port 2022


    -2
    on the listening side: sudo nc -lp 2022 | sudo tar -xvf - and on the sending side: tar -cvzf - ./*| nc -w 3 name_of_listening_host 2022
    smcpherson · 2009-03-27 09:59:33 12
  • Create a single tar.gz archive I know it's a very basic one, but it's one I keep forgetting. Show Sample Output


    -2
    tar -pczf archive_name.tar.gz /path/to/dir/or/file
    ryuslash · 2009-07-17 19:53:02 30
  • Using tape archive create a tar file in Stdout (-) and pipe that into a compound command to extract the tar file from Stdin at the destination. This similar to "Copy via tar pipe ...", but copies across file systems boundaries. I prefer to use cp -pr for copying within the same file system. Show Sample Output


    -2
    tar cpof - src |( cd des; tar xpof -)
    davidpotter42 · 2009-09-20 20:43:30 3
  • This script will list all the files in the tarballs present on any folder or subfolder of the provided path. The while loop is for echoing the file name of the tarball before listing the files, so the tarball can be identified


    -2
    find <path> -name "*.tgz" -or -name "*.tar.gz" | while read file; do echo "$file: "; tar -tzf $file; done
    polaco · 2009-11-10 20:39:04 36
  • The magic is performed by the parameter -t Show Sample Output


    -2
    for F in $(find ./ -name "*.tgz") ; do tar -tvzf $F ; done
    alchandia · 2009-11-11 00:50:52 3
  • This may seem like a long command, but it is great for making sure all file permissions are kept in tact. What it is doing is streaming the files in a sub-shell and then untarring them in the target directory. Please note that the -z command should not be used for local files and no perfomance increase will be visible as overhead processing (CPU) will be evident, and will slow down the copy. You also may keep simple with, but you don't have the progress info: cp -rpf /some/directory /other/path Show Sample Output


    -2
    dir='path to file'; tar cpf - "$dir" | pv -s $(du -sb "$dir" | awk '{print $1}') | tar xpf - -C /other/path
    starchox · 2010-01-19 19:05:45 3
  • xargs deals badly with special characters (such as space, ' and "). To see the problem try this: touch important_file touch 'not important_file' ls not* | xargs rm Parallel https://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/parallel/ does not have this problem.


    -2
    tar -tf <file.tar.gz> | parallel rm
    unixmonkey8046 · 2010-01-28 08:28:16 3
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defragment files
Thanks to flatcap for optimizing this command. This command takes advantage of the ext4 filesystem's resistance to fragmentation. By using this command, files that were previously fragmented will be copied / deleted / pasted essentially giving the filesystem another chance at saving the file contiguously. ( unlike FAT / NTFS, the *nix filesystem always try to save a file without fragmenting it ) My command only effects the home directory and only those files with your R/W (read / write ) permissions. There are two issues with this command: 1. it really won't help, it works, but linux doesn't suffer much (if any ) fragmentation and even fragmented files have fast I/O 2. it doesn't discriminate between fragmented and non-fragmented files, so a large ~/ directory with no fragments will take almost as long as an equally sized fragmented ~/ directory The benefits i managed to work into the command: 1. it only defragments files under 16mb, because a large file with fragments isn't as noticeable as a small file that's fragmented, and copy/ delete/ paste of large files would take too long 2. it gives a nice countdown in the terminal so you know how far how much progress is being made and just like other defragmenters you can stop at any time ( use ctrl+c ) 3. fast! i can defrag my ~/ directory in 11 seconds thanks to the ramdrive powering the command's temporary storage bottom line: 1. its only an experiment, safe ( i've used it several times for testing ), but probably not very effective ( unless you somehow have a fragmentation problem on linux ). might be a placebo for recent windows converts looking for a defrag utility on linux and won't accept no for an answer 2. it's my first commandlinefu command

Convert seconds to [DD:][HH:]MM:SS
Converts any number of seconds into days, hours, minutes and seconds. sec2dhms() { declare -i SS="$1" D=$(( SS / 86400 )) H=$(( SS % 86400 / 3600 )) M=$(( SS % 3600 / 60 )) S=$(( SS % 60 )) [ "$D" -gt 0 ] && echo -n "${D}:" [ "$H" -gt 0 ] && printf "%02g:" "$H" printf "%02g:%02g\n" "$M" "$S" }

Which processes are listening on a specific port (e.g. port 80)
swap out "80" for your port of interest. Can use port number or named ports e.g. "http"

Split a tarball into multiple parts
Create a tar file in multiple parts if it's to large for a single disk, your filesystem, etc. Rejoin later with `cat .tar.*|tar xf -`

list block devices
Shows all block devices in a tree with descruptions of what they are.

RTFM function
RTFMFTW.

repeat a command every one second
Short method of "while x=0; do foo ; sleep 1 ; done"

Quickly add a new user to all groups the default user is in
This is a standard procedure for me, whenever I set up a new Raspberry Pi system. Because the default user is "pi", I quickly replace it with my own (e.g. "kostis"), but I have to substitute that user to all of pi's groups first, before deleting the default account. xargs helps a lot with that in a single line, while avoiding boring "for" loops. For everything trickier, there's always "parallel" :)

Randomize lines in a file
Works in sort (GNU coreutils) 7.4, don't know when it was implemented but sometime the last 6 years.

Oneliner to get domain names list of all existing domain names (from wikipedia)
Quietly get a webpage from wikipedia: curl -s By default, don't output anything: sed -n Search for interesting lines: /<tr valign="top">/ With the matching lines: {} Search and replace any html tags: s/<[^>]*>//g Finally print the result: p


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