Compress a tar file without extracting the content

compressionfilestar

Is it possible to compress a tar file such that I don't end up with an archive file in an other archive file but just an archive file containing my content fx. a tar.gz file?
I don't want to extract the content of the tar file, since this is a very large file.

Best Answer

Compressing a tar file with gzip, bzip2 or xz after it is created without compression, is the same tarring + compressing the original data with tar + the z, j, resp. J option.

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Bash – Tar compress folder without specifying the filename

You can't use tar this way. Or you need to patch it.

If you don't give a file (you don't use the -f option), tar will use the standard output by default, i.e. the terminal and eventually fail because it will refuse to write compressed data on the terminal.

So, you have to call tar the proper way : tar -zcvf prog.tag.gz /home/jerry/prog.

Tar compression without directory structure

I think you can do this with the -C option.

From the tar man page:

-C directory, --cd directory, --directory directory
    In c and r mode, this changes the directory before adding the following files.
    In x mode, change directories after opening the archive but before extracting
    entries from the archive.

This means that you should be able to run

tar cvzf result.tar.gz -C /path/to/dir1/ . -C /path/to/dir2/ .

to achieve what you want.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Bash – Tar compress folder without specifying the filename

Tar compression without directory structure

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