Linux – Compress a whole folder in Linux (using tar)

What is tar

You may have come across the gzip and bzip2 commands which are used for compressing individual files. But if you want to compress a whole directory, then the command you need to use is tar. The tar command requires you to declare a number of options for it work, so the best way to understand how tar works is to see it in action:

Creating a tar file.

The tar command has several different modes, and to generate a tar file, you need to enable the “create” mode. Here’s how you compress a whole directory.

tar -cf {tar-filename} /path/to/dir

For the above, you can read the options “-cf” as: (c)reate a tar (f)ile with the name {tar-filename}, using the content from /path/to/dir.

If you want to do the above, but also see the progress of the tar activity, then do:

tar -cvf {tar-filename} /path/to/dir

For the above, you can read “-cvf” as: (c)reate a tar (f)ile in (v)erbose mode, called {tar-filename}, using the content from /path/to/dir.

Creating a compressed tar file.

The tar files that we have created so far, are not compressed files. A compressed tar file can be created in 2 steps, like this:

tar -cf {tar-filename} /path/to/dir        # step 1 - create the tarfile.
gzip {tar-filename}                     # step 2 - compress the tarfile.

However you can instruct the tar command to also do the gzipping for you:

tar -cvzf {tar-filename} /path/to/dir              # Here, tar compresses the tar file using the gzip utility.

For the above, you can read “-cvzf” as: (c)reate a g(z)ipped tar (f)ile in (v)erbose mode, called {tar-filename}, using the content from /path/to/dir.

Alternatively, you can use bzip2 utility like this:

tar -cvjf {tar-filename} /path/to/dir  

          # Here, the tar command compresses the tar file using the bzip2 utility.

Note: Options z and j don’t work in Solaris 10.

Extracting a tar file

To extract a tar file, you need to enable the tar command’s “extract” mode:

tar -xf tarfile.tar

For the above, you can read the options “-xf” as: e(x)tract the tar file of the (f)ilename, tarfile.tar.

tar -xvf name.tar  

       # This does the same as above, but in verbose mode.

For the above, you can read “-xvf” as: e(x)tract, in (v)erbose, the tar file of the (f)ilename, tarfile.tar.

Extracting a zipped tar file

So far we have only looked at how to extract an uncompressed tar file. But when dealing with compressed tar files, you can extract them by taking a 2 step approach:

gunzip tarfile.tar.gz  

   # step 1 – unzip the compressed tarfile.

tar -xvf tarfile.tar  

   # step 2 – extract the tarfile.

However it is easier to just do both steps in a single command like this:

tar -xvzf tarfile.tar.gz

For the above, you can read “-xvzf” as: gun(z)ip and then e(x)tract, in (v)erbose mode, the tar file, of the (f)ilename, tarfile.tar.gz

Similarly, if you are dealing with tar files that have been compressed with bzip2, you do:

tar -xjvf tarfile.tar.bzip2

Also see

How to compress a Whole Directory in Linux? (Coming soon)
The 5 main modes of tar (Coming soon)
20 practical example on how to use tar (Coming soon)