Dogcows Code - chaz/tar/blob - NEWS

   1 GNU tar NEWS - User visible changes.
   2
   3 version 1.13.20 - Paul Eggert, 2001-08-27
   4
   5 * Some bugs were fixed:
   6   - security problems
   7   - hard links to symbolic links
   8
   9 * New option --recursion (the default) that is the inverse of --no-recursion.
  10
  11 * New options --anchored, --ignore-case, --wildcards,
  12   --wildcards-match-slash, and their negations (e.g., --no-anchored).
  13   Along with --recursion and --no-recursion, these options control how
  14   exclude patterns are interpreted.
  15
  16 * The default interpretation of exclude patterns is now --no-anchored
  17   --no-ignore-case --recursion --wildcards --wildcards-match-slash.
  18   This is a quiet change to the semantics of --exclude.  The previous
  19   semantics were a failed attempt at backward compatibility but it
  20   became clear that the semantics were puzzling and did not satisfy
  21   everybody.  Rather than continue to try to revive that dead horse we
  22   thought it better to substitute cleaner semantics, with options so
  23   that you can change the behavior more to your liking.
  24
  25 * New message translations for Indonesian and Turkish.
  26   The translation for Korean has been withdrawn due to encoding errors.
  27   It will be reissued once those are fixed.
  28
  29 version 1.13.19 - Paul Eggert, 2001-01-13
  30
  31 * The -I option has been withdrawn, as it was buggy and confusing.
  32   Eventually it is planned to be reintroduced, with the same meaning as -T.
  33
  34 * With an option like -N DATE, if DATE starts with "/" or ".", it is taken
  35   to be a file name; the last-modified time of that file is used as the date.
  36
  37 version 1.13.18 - Paul Eggert, 2000-10-29
  38
  39 * Some security problems have been fixed.  `tar -x' now modifies only
  40   files under the working directory, unless you also specify an unsafe
  41   option like --absolute-names or --overwrite.
  42
  43 * The short name of the --bzip option has been changed to -j,
  44   and -I is now an alias for -T, for compatibility with Solaris tar.
  45
  46 * The manual is now distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
  47
  48 * The new environment variable TAR_OPTIONS holds default command-line options.
  49
  50 * The --no-recursion option now affects extraction too.
  51
  52 * The wording in some diagnostics has been changed slightly.
  53
  54 * Snapshot files now record whether each file was accessed via NFS.
  55   The new file format is upward- and downward-compatible with the old.
  56
  57 * New language supported: da.
  58
  59 * Compilation by traditional (K&R) C compilers is no longer supported.
  60   If you still use such a compiler, please use GCC instead.
  61
  62 * This version of tar works best with GNU gzip test version 1.3 or later.
  63   Please see <ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/>.
  64
  65 * `tar --delete -f -' now works again.
  66
  67 version 1.13.17 - Paul Eggert, 2000-01-07.
  68
  69 * `tar --delete -f -' is no longer allowed; it was too buggy.
  70 * Diagnostic messages have been made more regular and consistent.
  71
  72 version 1.13.16 - Paul Eggert, 1999-12-13.
  73
  74 * By default, tar now refuses to overwrite an existing file when
  75   extracting files from an archive; instead, it removes the file
  76   before extracting it.  If the existing file is a symbolic link, the
  77   link is removed and not the pointed-to file.  There is one
  78   exception: existing nonempty directories are not removed, nor are
  79   their ownerships or permissions extracted.  This fixes some
  80   longstanding security problems.
  81
  82   The new --overwrite option enables the old default behavior.
  83
  84   For regular files, tar implements this change by using the O_EXCL
  85   option of `open' to ensure that it creates the file; if this fails, it
  86   removes the file and tries again.  This is similar to the behavior of
  87   the --unlink-first option, but it is faster in the common case of
  88   extracting a new directory.
  89
  90 * By default, tar now ignores file names containing a component of `..'
  91   when extracting, and warns about such file names when creating an archive.
  92   To enable the old behavior, use the -P or --absolute-names option.
  93
  94 * Tar now handles file names with multibyte encodings (e.g. UTF-8, Shift-JIS)
  95   correctly.  It relies on the mbrtowc function to handle multibytes.
  96
  97 * The file generated by -g or --listed-incremental now uses a format
  98   that is independent of locale, so that users need not worry about
  99   locale when restoring a backup.  This is needed for proper support
 100   of multibyte characters.  Old-format files can still be read, and
 101   older versions of GNU tar can read new-format files, unless member
 102   names have multibyte chars.
 103
 104 * Many diagnostics have been changed slightly, so that file names are
 105   now output unambiguously.  File names in diagnostics now are either
 106   `quoted like this' (in the default C locale) or are followed by
 107   colon, newline, or space, depending on context.  Unprintable
 108   characters are escaped with a C-like backslash conventions.
 109   Terminating characters (e.g. close-quote, colon, newline)
 110   are also escaped as needed.
 111
 112 * tar now ignores socket files when creating an archive.
 113   Previously tar archived sockets as fifos, which caused problems.
 114
 115 version 1.13.15 - Paul Eggert, 1999-12-03.
 116
 117 * If a file's ctime changes when being archived, report an error.
 118   Previously tar looked at mtime, which missed some errors.
 119
 120 version 1.13.14 - Paul Eggert, 1999-11-07.
 121
 122 * New translations ja, pt_BR.
 123 * New options --help and --version for rmt.
 124 * Ignore Solaris door files when creating an archive.
 125
 126 version 1.13.13 - Paul Eggert, 1999-10-11.
 127
 128 * Invalid headers in tar files now elicit errors, not just warnings.
 129 * `tar --version' output conforms to the latest GNU coding standards.
 130 * If you specify an invalid date, `tar' now substitutes (time_t) -1.
 131 * `configure --with-dmalloc' is no longer available.
 132
 133 version 1.13.12 - Paul Eggert, 1999-09-24.
 134
 135 * `tar' now supports hard links to symbolic links.
 136
 137 * New options --no-same-owner, --no-same-permissions.
 138
 139 * --total now also outputs a human-readable size, and a throughput value.
 140
 141 * `tar' now uses two's-complement base-256 when outputting header
 142   values that are out of the range of the standard unsigned base-8
 143   format.  This affects archive members with negative or huge time
 144   stamps or uids, and archive members 8 GB or larger.  The new tar
 145   archives cannot be read by traditional tar, or by older versions of
 146   GNU tar.  Use the --old-archive option to revert to the old
 147   behavior, which uses unportable representations for negative values,
 148   and which rejects large files.
 149
 150 * On 32-bit hosts, `tar' now assumes that an incoming time stamp T in
 151   the range 2**31 <= T < 2**32 represents the negative time (T -
 152   2**32).  This behavior is nonstandard and is not portable to 64-bit
 153   time_t hosts, so `tar' issues a warning.
 154
 155 * `tar' no longer gives up extracting immediately upon discovering
 156   that an archive contains garbage at the end.  It attempts to extract
 157   as many files as possible from the good data before the garbage.
 158
 159 * A read error now causes a nonzero exit status, not just a warning.
 160
 161 * Some diagnostics have been reworded for consistency.
 162
 163
 164 version 1.13.11 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-23.
 165
 166 * The short name of the --bzip option has been changed to -I,
 167   for compatibility with paxutils.
 168
 169 * -T /dev/null now matches nothing; previously, it matched anything
 170   if no explicit operands were given.
 171
 172 * The `--' option now works the same as with other GNU utilities;
 173   it causes later operands to be interpreted as file names, not options,
 174   even if they begin with `-'.
 175
 176 * For the --newer and --after-date options, the table of time zone
 177   abbreviations like `EST' has been updated to match current practice.
 178   Also, local time abbreviations are now recognized, even if they are
 179   not in tar's hardwired table.  Remember, though, that you should use
 180   numeric UTC offsets like `-0500' instead of abbreviations like
 181   `EST', as abbreviations are not standardized and are ambiguous.
 182
 183
 184 version 1.13.10 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-20.
 185
 186 * `tar' now uses signed base-64 when outputting header values that are
 187   out of the range of the standard unsigned base-8 format.  [This
 188   change was superseded in 1.13.12, described above.]
 189
 190
 191 version 1.13.9 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-18.
 192
 193 * `tar' now writes two zero blocks at end-of-archive instead of just one.
 194   POSIX.1 requires this, and some other `tar' implementations check for it.
 195
 196 * `tar' no longer silently accepts a block containing nonzero checksum bytes
 197   as a zero block.
 198
 199 * `tar' now reads buggy tar files that have a null byte at the start of a
 200   numeric header field.
 201
 202
 203 version 1.13.8 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-16.
 204
 205 * For compatibility with traditional `tar', intermediate directories
 206   created automatically by root are no longer given the uid and gid of
 207   the original file or directory.
 208
 209
 210 version 1.13.7 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-14.
 211
 212 * --listed-incremental and --newer are now incompatible options.
 213
 214 * When creating an archive, leading `./' is no longer stripped,
 215   to match traditional tar's behavior (and simplify the documentation).
 216
 217 * --diff without --absolute-names no longer falls back on absolute names.
 218
 219
 220 version 1.13.6 - Paul Eggert, 1999-08-11.
 221
 222 * An --exclude pattern containing / now excludes a file only if it matches an
 223   initial prefix of the file name; a pattern without / continues to
 224   exclude a file if it matches any file name component.
 225
 226 * The protocol for talking to rmt has been extended slightly.
 227   Open flags are now communicated in symbolic format as well as numeric.
 228   The symbolic format (e.g. "O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC") is for portability
 229   when rmt is operating on a different operating system from tar.
 230   The numeric format is retained, and rmt uses it if symbolic format is absent,
 231   for backward compatibility with older versions of tar and rmt.
 232
 233 * When writing GNU tar format headers, tar now uses signed base-64
 234   for values that cannot be represented in unsigned octal.
 235   This supports larger files (2**66 - 1 bytes instead of 2**33 - 1 bytes),
 236   larger uids, negative time stamps, etc.
 237
 238 * When extracting files with unknown ownership, tar now looks up the
 239   uid and gid "nobody" on hosts whose headers do not define UID_NOBODY
 240   and GID_NOBODY, and falls back on uid/gid -2 if there is no "nobody".
 241
 242 * tar -t --numeric-owner now prints numeric uids and gids, not symbolic.
 243
 244 * New option -y or --bzip2 for bzip2 compression, by popular request.
 245
 246
 247 version 1.13.5 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-20.
 248
 249 * Do the delayed updates of file metadata even after a fatal error.
 250
 251
 252 version 1.13.4 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-20.
 253
 254 * Do not chmod unless we are root or the -p option was given;
 255   this matches historical practice.
 256
 257
 258 version 1.13.3 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-16.
 259
 260 * A path name is excluded if any of its file name components matches an
 261   excluded pattern, even if the path name was specified on the command line.
 262   Also see 1.13.6 for later changes in this area.
 263
 264
 265 version 1.13.2 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-14.
 266
 267 * Bug reporting address changed to <bug-tar@gnu.org>.
 268
 269
 270 version 1.13.1 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-12.
 271
 272 * Bug fixes only.
 273 \f
 274 version 1.13 - Paul Eggert, 1999-07-08.
 275
 276 * Support for large files, e.g. files larger than 2 GB on many 32-bit hosts.
 277   Also, support for larger uids, device ids, etc.
 278 * Many bug fixes and porting fixes.
 279 * This release is only for fixes.  A more ambitious test release,
 280   with new features, is available as part of the paxutils.  Please see:
 281     ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/paxutils/
 282   The fixes in this release are intended to be merged with paxutils
 283   at some point, but they haven't been merged yet.
 284 * An interim GNU tar alpha had new --bzip2 and --ending-file options,
 285   but they have been removed to maintain compatibility with paxutils.
 286   Please try --use=bzip2 instead of --bzip2.
 287 \f
 288 Version 1.12 - François Pinard, 1997-04.
 289
 290 Sensitive matters
 291 * Use shell globbing patterns for --label, instead of regular expressions.
 292 * Do not quote anymore internally over the quoting done by the shell.
 293
 294 Output for humans
 295 * Offer internationalization capabilities of most recent GNU gettext.
 296 * Messages available in many more languages, thanks to all translators!
 297 * Usage of ISO 8601 dates in listings, instead of local American dates.
 298 * More normalization and cleanup in error messages.
 299
 300 Creation
 301 * For helping using tar with find, offer a --no-recursion option.
 302 * Implement --numeric-owner for ignoring symbolic names at create time.
 303 * New --owner, --group --mode options, still preliminary.
 304 * Recognize creating an archive on /dev/null, so Amanda works faster.
 305 * Object to the creation of an empty archive (like in `tar cf FILE').
 306 * Barely start implementing --posix and POSIXLY_CORRECT.
 307
 308 Extraction
 309 * Make a better job at restoring file and directory attributes.
 310 * Automatically attempt deleting existing files when in the way.
 311 * Option --unlink-first (-U) removes most files prior to extraction.
 312 * Option --recursive-unlink removes non-empty directories when in the way.
 313 * Option --numeric-owner ignores owner/group names, it uses UID/GID instead.
 314 * Use global umask when creating missing intermediate directories.
 315 * When symlinks are not available, extract symbolic links as hard links.
 316 * Diagnose extraction of contiguous files as regular files.
 317 * New --backup, --suffix and --version-control options.
 318
 319 Various changes
 320 * Better support of huge archives with --tape-length and --totals.
 321 * Rename option --read-full-blocks (-B) to --read-full-records (-B).
 322 * Rename option --block-size (-b) to --blocking-factor (-b).
 323 * Rename option --record-number (-R) to --block-number (-R).
 324 * With --block-number (-R), report null blocks and end of file.
 325 * Implement --record-size for introducing a size in bytes.
 326 * Delete --block-compress option and rather decide it automatically.
 327 * Rename option --modification-time to --touch.
 328
 329 Many bugs are squashed, while others still run free.
 330 \f
 331 Version 1.11.8 - François Pinard, 1995-06.
 332
 333 * Messages available in French, German, Portuguese and Swedish.
 334 * The distribution provides a rudimentary Texinfo manual.
 335 * The device defaults to stdin/stdout, unless overridden by the installer.
 336 * Option --sparse (-S) should work on more systems.
 337 * Option --rsh-command may select an alternative remote shell program.
 338
 339 Most changes are internal, and should yield better portability.
 340 \f
 341 Version 1.11.2 - Michael Bushnell, 1993-03.
 342
 343 * Changes in backup scripts: cleaned up considerably; notices error
 344 conditions better over rsh; DUMP_REMIND_SCRIPT is now an option in
 345 backup-specs; new file dump-remind is an example of a
 346 DUMP_REMIND_SCRIPT.
 347
 348 * Superfluous "Reading dirname" was a bug; fixed.
 349
 350 * Incompatibility problems with a bug on Solaris are fixed.
 351
 352 * New option --gzip (aliases are --ungzip and -z); calls gzip instead
 353 of compress.  Also, --use-compress-program lets you specify any
 354 compress program.  --compress-block is renamed --block-compress and
 355 now requires one of the three compression options to be specified.
 356
 357 * Several error messages are cleaned up.
 358
 359 * Directory owners are now set properly when running as root.
 360
 361 * Provide DUMP_REMIND_SCRIPT in backup-specs as a possible option
 362 for --info-script.
 363
 364 * Behave better with broken rmt servers.
 365
 366 * Dump scripts no longer use --atime-preserve; this causes a nasty probem.
 367
 368 * Several Makefile cleanups.
 369 \f
 370 Version 1.11.1 - Michael Bushnell, 1992-09.
 371
 372 * Many bug fixes.
 373 \f
 374 Version 1.11 - Michael Bushnell, 1992-09.
 375 Version 1.10.16 - 1992-07.
 376 Version 1.10.15 - 1992-06.
 377 Version 1.10.14 - 1992-05.
 378 Version 1.10.13 - 1992-01.
 379
 380 * Many bug fixes.
 381
 382 * Now uses GNU standard configure, generated by Autoconf.
 383
 384 * Long options now use `--'; use of `+' is deprecated and support
 385 for it will eventually be removed.
 386
 387 * New option --null causes filenames read by -T to be
 388 null-terminated, and causes -C to be ignored.
 389
 390 * New option --remove-files deletes files (but not directories)
 391 after they are added to the archive.
 392
 393 * New option --ignore-failed-read prevents read-errors from affecting
 394 the exit status.
 395
 396 * New option --checkpoint prints occasional messages as the tape
 397 is being read or written.
 398
 399 * New option --show-omitted-dirs prints the names of directories
 400 omitted from the archive.
 401
 402 * Some tape drives which use a non-standard method of indicating
 403 end-of-tape now work correctly with multi-tape archives.
 404
 405 * --volno-file: Read the volume number used in prompting the user
 406 (but not in recording volume ID's on the archive) from a file.
 407
 408 * When using --multi-volume, you can now give multiple -f arguments;
 409 the various tape drives will get used in sequence and then wrap
 410 around to the beginning.
 411
 412 * Remote archive names no longer have to be in /dev: any file with a
 413 `:' is interpreted as remote.  If new option --force-local is given,
 414 then even archive files with a `:' are considered local.
 415
 416 * New option --atime-preserve restores (if possible) atimes to
 417 their original values after dumping the file.
 418
 419 * No longer does tar confusingly dump "." when you don't tell it
 420 what to dump.
 421
 422 * When extracting directories, tar now correctly restores their
 423 modification and access times.
 424
 425 * Longnames support is redone differently--long name info directly
 426 precedes the long-named file or link in the archive, so you no
 427 longer have to wait for the extract to hit the end of the tape for
 428 long names to work.
 429 \f
 430 Version 1.10 - Michael Bushnell, 1991-07.
 431
 432 * Filename to -G is optional.  -C works right.  Names +newer and
 433 +newer-mtime work right.
 434
 435 * -g is now +incremental, -G is now +listed-incremental.
 436
 437 * Sparse files now work correctly.
 438
 439 * +volume is now called +label.
 440
 441 * +exclude now takes a filename argument, and +exclude-from does
 442 what +exclude used to do.
 443
 444 * Exit status is now correct.
 445
 446 * +totals keeps track of total I/O and prints it when tar exits.
 447
 448 * When using +label with +extract, the label is now a regexp.
 449
 450 * New option +tape-length (-L) does multi-volume handling like BSD
 451 dump: you tell tar how big the tape is and it will prompt at that
 452 point instead of waiting for a write error.
 453
 454 * New backup scripts level-0 and level-1 which might be useful
 455 to people.  They use a file "backup-specs" for information, and
 456 shouldn't need local modification.  These are what we use to do
 457 all our backups at the FSF.
 458 \f
 459 Version 1.09 - Jay Fenlason, 1990-10.
 460 Version 1.08 - Jay Fenlason, 1990-01.
 461 Versions 1.07 back to 1.00 by Jay Fenlason.
 462
 463 * See ChangeLog for more details.
 464
 465 \f
 466
 467 Copyright 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 Free
 468 Software Foundation, Inc.
 469
 470 This file is part of GNU tar.
 471
 472 GNU tar is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
 473 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
 474 the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option)
 475 any later version.
 476
 477 GNU tar is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 478 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 479 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 480 GNU General Public License for more details.
 481
 482 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
 483 along with tar; see the file COPYING.  If not, write to
 484 the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
 485 Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
 486
 487 \f
 488
 489 Local Variables:
 490 coding: iso-latin-1
 491 End: