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1 README for GNU tar
2 See the end of file for copying conditions.
3
4 * Introduction
5
6 Please glance through *all* sections of this
7 `README' file before starting configuration. Also make sure you read files
8 `ABOUT-NLS' and `INSTALL' if you are not familiar with them already.
9
10 If you got the `tar' distribution in `shar' format, time stamps ought to be
11 properly restored; do not ignore such complaints at `unshar' time.
12
13 GNU `tar' saves many files together into a single tape or disk
14 archive, and can restore individual files from the archive. It includes
15 multivolume support, the ability to archive sparse files, automatic archive
16 compression/decompression, remote archives and special features that allow
17 `tar' to be used for incremental and full backups. This distribution
18 also includes `rmt', the remote tape server. The `mt' tape drive control
19 program is in the GNU `cpio' distribution.
20
21 GNU `tar' is derived from John Gilmore's public domain `tar'.
22
23 See file `ABOUT-NLS' for how to customize this program to your language.
24 See file `COPYING' for copying conditions.
25 See file `INSTALL' for compilation and installation instructions.
26 See file `PORTS' for various ports of GNU tar to non-Unix systems.
27 See file `NEWS' for a list of major changes in the current release.
28 See file `THANKS' for a list of contributors.
29
30 Besides those configure options documented in files `INSTALL' and
31 `ABOUT-NLS', an extra option may be accepted after `./configure':
32
33 * Install
34
35 ** Selecting the default archive format.
36
37 The default archive format is GNU, this can be overridden by
38 presetting DEFAULT_ARCHIVE_FORMAT while configuring. The allowed
39 values are GNU, V7, OLDGNU, USTAR and POSIX.
40
41 ** Selecting the default archive device
42
43 The default archive device is now `stdin' on read and `stdout' on write.
44 The installer can still override this by presetting `DEFAULT_ARCHIVE'
45 in the environment before configuring (the behavior of `-[0-7]' or
46 `-[0-7]lmh' options in `tar' are then derived automatically). Similarly,
47 `DEFAULT_BLOCKING' can be preset to something else than 20.
48
49 ** `--disable-largefile' omits support for large files, even if the
50 operating system supports large files. Typically, large files are
51 those larger on 2 GB on a 32-bit host.
52
53 * Installation hints
54
55 Here are a few hints which might help installing `tar' on some systems.
56
57 ** gzip and bzip2.
58
59 GNU tar uses the gzip and bzip2 programs to read and write compressed
60 archives. If you don't have these programs already, you need to
61 install them. Their sources can be found at:
62
63 ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/
64 http://sourceware.cygnus.com/bzip2/
65
66 If you see the following symptoms:
67
68 $ tar -xzf file.tar.gz
69 gzip: stdin: decompression OK, trailing garbage ignored
70 tar: Child returned status 2
71
72 then you have encountered a gzip incompatibility that should be fixed
73 in gzip test version 1.3, which as of this writing is available at
74 <ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/gzip/>. You can work around the
75 incompatibility by using a shell command like
76 `gzip -d <file.tar.gz | tar -xzf -'.
77
78 ** Solaris issues.
79
80 GNU tar exercises many features that can cause problems with older GCC
81 versions. In particular, GCC 2.8.1 (sparc, -O1 or -O2) is known to
82 miscompile GNU tar. No compiler-related problems have been reported
83 when using GCC 2.95.2 or later.
84
85 Recent versions of Solaris tar sport a new -E option to generate
86 extended headers in an undocumented format. GNU tar does not
87 understand these headers.
88
89 ** Static linking.
90
91 Some platform will, by default, prepare a smaller `tar' executable
92 which depends on shared libraries. Since GNU `tar' may be used for
93 system-level backups and disaster recovery, installers might prefer to
94 force static linking, making a bigger `tar' executable maybe, but able to
95 work standalone, in situations where shared libraries are not available.
96 The way to achieve static linking varies between systems. Set LDFLAGS
97 to a value from the table below, before configuration (see `INSTALL').
98
99 Platform Compiler LDFLAGS
100
101 (any) Gnu C -static
102 AIX (vendor) -bnso -bI:/lib/syscalls.exp
103 HPUX (vendor) -Wl,-a,archive
104 IRIX (vendor) -non_shared
105 OSF (vendor) -non_shared
106 SCO 3.2v5 (vendor) -dn
107 Solaris (vendor) -Bstatic
108 SunOS (vendor) -Bstatic
109
110 ** Failed tests `ignfail.sh' or `incremen.sh'.
111
112 In an NFS environment, lack of synchronization between machine clocks
113 might create difficulties to any tool comparing dates and file time stamps,
114 like `tar' in incremental dumps. This has been a recurrent problem with
115 GNU Make for the last few years. We would like a general solution.
116
117 ** BSD compatibility matters.
118
119 Set LIBS to `-lbsd' before configuration (see `INSTALL') if the linker
120 complains about `bsd_ioctl' (Slackware). Also set CPPFLAGS to
121 `-I/usr/include/bsd' if <sgtty.h> is not found (Slackware).
122
123 ** OPENStep 4.2 swap files
124
125 Tar cannot read the file /private/vm/swapfile.front (even as root).
126 This file is not a real file, but some kind of uncompressed view of
127 the real compressed swap file; there is no reason to back it up, so
128 the simplest workaround is to avoid tarring this file.
129
130 * Special topics
131
132 Here are a few special matters about GNU `tar', not related to build
133 matters. See previous section for such.
134
135 ** File attributes.
136
137 About *security*, it is probable that future releases of `tar' will have
138 some behavior changed. There are many pending suggestions to choose from.
139 Today, extracting an archive not being `root', `tar' will restore suid/sgid
140 bits on files but owned by the extracting user. `root' automatically gets
141 a lot of special privileges, `-p' might later become required to get them.
142
143 GNU `tar' does not properly restore symlink attributes. Various systems
144 implement flavors of symbolic links showing different behavior and
145 properties. We did not successfully sorted all these out yet. Currently,
146 the `lchown' call will be used if available, but that's all.
147
148 ** POSIX compliance.
149
150 GNU `tar' is able to create archive in the following formats:
151
152 *** The format of UNIX version 7
153 *** POSIX.1-1988 format, also known as "ustar format"
154 *** POSIX.1-2001 format, also known as "pax format"
155 *** Old GNU format (described below)
156
157 In addition to those, GNU `tar' is also able to read archives
158 produced by `star' archiver.
159
160 A so called `Old GNU' format is based on an early draft of the
161 POSIX 1003.1 `ustar' standard which is different from the final
162 standard. It defines its extensions (such as incremental backups
163 and handling of the long file names) in a way incompatible with
164 any existing tar archive format, therefore the use of old GNU
165 format is strongly discouraged.
166
167 Please read the file NEWS for more information about POSIX compliance
168 and new `tar' features.
169
170 * What's next?
171
172 In the future we will try to release tar-1.14 as soon as possible and
173 start merging with paxutils afterwards. We'll also try to rewrite
174 some parts of the documentation after paxutils has been merged.
175
176 * Bug reporting.
177
178 Send bug reports to <bug-tar@gnu.org>. A bug report should contain
179 an adequate description of the problem, your input, what you expected,
180 what you got, and why this is wrong. Diffs are welcome, but they only
181 describe a solution, from which the problem might be uneasy to infer.
182 If needed, submit actual data files with your report. Small data files
183 are preferred. Big files may sometimes be necessary, but do not send them
184 to the report address; rather take special arrangement with the maintainer.
185
186 Your feedback will help us to make a better and more portable package.
187 Consider documentation errors as bugs, and report them as such. If you
188 develop anything pertaining to `tar' or have suggestions, let us know
189 and share your findings by writing to <bug-tar@gnu.org>.
190
191 \f
192 * Copying
193
194 Copyright (C) 1990, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000,
195 2001, 2003, 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
196
197 This file is part of GNU tar.
198
199 GNU tar is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
200 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
201 the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option)
202 any later version.
203
204 GNU tar is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
205 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
206 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
207 GNU General Public License for more details.
208
209 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
210 along with tar; see the file COPYING. If not, write to
211 the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
212 Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
213
214 \f
215 Local Variables:
216 mode: outline
217 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
218 version-control: never
219 End:
220
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