what is Linux command for compressing the contents of a Directory?

[WorldNews]

Hello,

What is Linux command for compressing all the files under a Directory, as
well as all the files in sub-directories under that directory, so that upon
uncompression the files are created in the right directory and sub-directory.

Also of course what is the command to un-compress this compressed file?

In case: the Linux OS here is Redhat Enterprise and the web server is Apache.

Regards,

[Dan Grossman]

Use tar, or gzip, or zip... those are commonly included packages in major distributions. There are other compression utilities available too.

To learn how to use the package, consult the manual.

Type "man tar" or "man gzip" or "man zip".

[WorldNews]

Hi,

Could you kindly tell me what is the exact command for this task?
I really do not have the time to read man instructions which are very
cryptic at best and given the importance of this task, do not want
to task mis-reading it.

Regards,

Use tar, or gzip, or zip... those are commonly included packages in major distributions. There are other compression utilities available too.

To learn how to use the package, consult the manual.

Type "man tar" or "man gzip" or "man zip".

[Dan Grossman]

http://www.tonyspencer.com/2005/11/0...b-directories/

[WorldNews]

Hi,

1st, thanx for your quick reply.

2nd, it does not work. That is after issuing the command
tar -cvf main_backup_Oct1309.tar ROOT/
where Root is the directory below where I am now which contains many
files and subdirectories, then I instantly get the file main_backup_Oct1309.tar
which is only 10240 KB which cannot be right since there are like 2000 files
under that directory.

3rd, what is the command for unpacking the tar files generated by this
compressions command?

Regards,

http://www.tonyspencer.com/2005/11/0...b-directories/

[cpace1983]

tar -cvf tarfile.tar /location/to/backup

is correct.

tar -xvf tarfile.tar

will extract it.

du -h /path

will tell you how large the directory is that you are backing up.

[Dan Grossman]

Add in the -z flag to add gzip compression and you'll get an even smaller file out

[WorldNews]

Hello,

I figured out what I was doing wrong.
I was issuing the compression command, that is:
tar -cvf backupfile.tar xyz.com/

from a sym linked (aliased) location of that directory and not from the
actual psychical location of that directory. Once I CDed to the actual
location of that dir and issued the compression command then it was Ok
and the resulting tar file is 1.5GB.

You know I had this realization about what I was doing wrong while
walking in a cold snow falling here in Vienna (Austria) so all of a sudden
I kind of pumped my fist Eurika, and these Austrians are very stuffy, so I kind of stood out

Ich wünsche alles eine sehr Guten Tag and Nacht

Add in the -z flag to add gzip compression and you'll get an even smaller file out