From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG  Tue Jul 12 13:26:48 2005
Return-Path: <owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG>
X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125])
	by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id AA71216A41C
	for <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>;
	Tue, 12 Jul 2005 13:26:48 +0000 (GMT)
	(envelope-from xfb52@dial.pipex.com)
Received: from smtp-out1.blueyonder.co.uk (smtp-out1.blueyonder.co.uk
	[195.188.213.4])
	by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C788443D53
	for <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>;
	Tue, 12 Jul 2005 13:26:46 +0000 (GMT)
	(envelope-from xfb52@dial.pipex.com)
Received: from [82.41.37.55] ([82.41.37.55]) by smtp-out1.blueyonder.co.uk
	with Microsoft SMTPSVC(5.0.2195.6713); 
	Tue, 12 Jul 2005 14:27:29 +0100
Message-ID: <42D3C515.7070305@dial.pipex.com>
Date: Tue, 12 Jul 2005 14:26:45 +0100
From: Alex Zbyslaw <xfb52@dial.pipex.com>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-GB; rv:1.7.8) Gecko/20050530
X-Accept-Language: en, en-us, pl
MIME-Version: 1.0
To: Giorgos Keramidas <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr>, 
	"Sherman, Michael (GE Energy)" <michael.sherman@og.ge.com>
References: <9CC5C6311E4BBB45BF135CAF2B9B6DB4014AC60E@SCHMLVEM04.e2k.ad.ge.com>
	<20050712120326.GA29851@beatrix.daedalusnetworks.priv>
In-Reply-To: <20050712120326.GA29851@beatrix.daedalusnetworks.priv>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-OriginalArrivalTime: 12 Jul 2005 13:27:29.0513 (UTC)
	FILETIME=[739B7D90:01C586E5]
Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: tar or gtar
X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5
Precedence: list
List-Id: User questions <freebsd-questions.freebsd.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions>, 
	<mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-questions>
List-Post: <mailto:freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
List-Help: <mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=help>
List-Subscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions>, 
	<mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=subscribe>
X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 12 Jul 2005 13:26:48 -0000

Giorgos Keramidas wrote:

>Hmmm, I'm not sitting on FreeBSD, but looking at the manpage I can only
>see -y (bzip2 compression) and -z (gzip compression); I couldn't find an
>option called -Z.
>
-Z is compress -- possibly gtar only.  It's much worse than the 
alternatives and is only useful for compatibility.  I still see .Z files 
occasionally.  A bit surprised to see it completely missing from bsd tar.

$ tar -cZf foo.tar.Z foo
tar: .Z compression not supported

So it's still recognised at some level.

In fact

$ tar -cf foo.tar foo
$ compress foo.tar
$ tar -tZf foo.tar.Z
foo
foo/files
foo/files/patch-Makefile.in
foo/distinfo
foo/pkg-descr
foo/pkg-plist
foo/Makefile

So it will still unpack.  Presumably won't create since gzip is now 
ubiquitous and compress is awful by comparison.


--Alex