TAR

TAR(1) GNU TAR Manual TAR(1)

NAME top

tar – an archiving utility

SYNOPSIS top

Traditional usage
tar {A|c|d|r|t|u|x}[GnSkUWOmpsMBiajJzZhPlRvwo] [ARG…]

UNIX-style usage
tar -A [OPTIONS] ARCHIVE ARCHIVE

tar -c [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar -d [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar -t [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [MEMBER…]

tar -r [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar -u [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar -x [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [MEMBER…]

GNU-style usage
tar {–catenate|–concatenate} [OPTIONS] ARCHIVE ARCHIVE

tar –create [–file ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar {–diff|–compare} [–file ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar –delete [–file ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [MEMBER…]

tar –append [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar –list [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [MEMBER…]

tar –test-label [–file ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [LABEL…]

tar –update [–file ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar –update [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [FILE…]

tar {–extract|–get} [-f ARCHIVE] [OPTIONS] [MEMBER…]

NOTE top

This manpage is a short description of GNU tar. For a detailed
discussion, including examples and usage recommendations, refer to
the GNU Tar Manual available in texinfo format. If the info reader
and the tar documentation are properly installed on your system, the
command

info tar

should give you access to the complete manual.

You can also view the manual using the info mode in emacs(1), or find
it in various formats online at

http://www.gnu.org/software/tar/manual

If any discrepancies occur between this manpage and the GNU Tar
Manual, the later shall be considered the authoritative source.

DESCRIPTION top

GNU tar is an archiving program designed to store multiple files in a
single file (an archive), and to manipulate such archives. The
archive can be either a regular file or a device (e.g. a tape drive,
hence the name of the program, which stands for tape archiver), which
can be located either on the local or on a remote machine.

Option styles
Options to GNU tar can be given in three different styles. In
traditional style, the first argument is a cluster of option letters
and all subsequent arguments supply arguments to those options that
require them. The arguments are read in the same order as the option
letters. Any command line words that remain after all options has
been processed are treated as non-optional arguments: file or archive
member names.

For example, the c option requires creating the archive, the v option
requests the verbose operation, and the f option takes an argument
that sets the name of the archive to operate upon. The following
command, written in the traditional style, instructs tar to store all
files from the directory /etc into the archive file etc.tar verbosely
listing the files being archived:

tar cfv a.tar /etc

In UNIX or short-option style, each option letter is prefixed with a
single dash, as in other command line utilities. If an option takes
argument, the argument follows it, either as a separate command line
word, or immediately following the option. However, if the option
takes an optional argument, the argument must follow the option let‐
ter without any intervening whitespace, as in -g/tmp/snar.db.

Any number of options not taking arguments can be clustered together
after a single dash, e.g. -vkp. Options that take arguments (whether
mandatory or optional), can appear at the end of such a cluster, e.g.
-vkpf a.tar.

The example command above written in the short-option style could
look like:

tar -cvf a.tar /etc
or
tar -c -v -f a.tar /etc

In GNU or long-option style, each option begins with two dashes and
has a meaningful name, consisting of lower-case letters and dashes.
When used, the long option can be abbreviated to its initial letters,
provided that this does not create ambiguity. Arguments to long
options are supplied either as a separate command line word, immedi‐
ately following the option, or separated from the option by an equals
sign with no intervening whitespace. Optional arguments must always
use the latter method.

Here are several ways of writing the example command in this style:

tar –create –file a.tar –verbose /etc
or (abbreviating some options):
tar –cre –file=a.tar –verb /etc

The options in all three styles can be intermixed, although doing so
with old options is not encouraged.

Operation mode
The options listed in the table below tell GNU tar what operation it
is to perform. Exactly one of them must be given. Meaning of non-
optional arguments depends on the operation mode requested.

-A, –catenate, –concatenate
Append archive to the end of another archive. The arguments
are treated as the names of archives to append. All archives
must be of the same format as the archive they are appended
to, otherwise the resulting archive might be unusable with
non-GNU implementations of tar. Notice also that when more
than one archive is given, the members from archives other
than the first one will be accessible in the resulting archive
only if using the -i (–ignore-zeros) option.

Compressed archives cannot be concatenated.

-c, –create
Create a new archive. Arguments supply the names of the files
to be archived. Directories are archived recursively, unless
the –no-recursion option is given.

-d, –diff, –compare
Find differences between archive and file system. The argu‐
ments are optional and specify archive members to compare. If
not given, the current working directory is assumed.

–delete
Delete from the archive. The arguments supply names of the
archive members to be removed. At least one argument must be
given.

This option does not operate on compressed archives. There is
no short option equivalent.

-r, –append
Append files to the end of an archive. Arguments have the
same meaning as for -c (–create).

-t, –list
List the contents of an archive. Arguments are optional.
When given, they specify the names of the members to list.

–test-label
Test the archive volume label and exit. When used without
arguments, it prints the volume label (if any) and exits with
status 0. When one or more command line arguments are given.
tar compares the volume label with each argument. It exits
with code 0 if a match is found, and with code 1 otherwise.
No output is displayed, unless used together with the -v
(–verbose) option.

There is no short option equivalent for this option.

-u, –update
Append files which are newer than the corresponding copy in
the archive. Arguments have the same meaning as with -c and
-r options.

-x, –extract, –get
Extract files from an archive. Arguments are optional. When
given, they specify names of the archive members to be
extracted.

–show-defaults
Show built-in defaults for various tar options and
exit. No arguments are allowed.

-?, –help
Display a short option summary and exit. No arguments
allowed.

–usage
Display a list of available options and exit. No argu‐
ments allowed.

–version
Print program version and copyright information and
exit.

OPTIONS top

Operation modifiers
–check-device
Check device numbers when creating incremental archives
(default).

-g, –listed-incremental=FILE
Handle new GNU-format incremental backups. FILE is the
name of a snapshot file, where tar stores additional
information which is used to decide which files changed
since the previous incremental dump and, consequently,
must be dumped again. If FILE does not exist when
creating an archive, it will be created and all files
will be added to the resulting archive (the level 0
dump). To create incremental archives of non-zero
level N, create a copy of the snapshot file created
during the level N-1, and use it as FILE.

When listing or extracting, the actual contents of FILE
is not inspected, it is needed only due to syntactical
requirements. It is therefore common practice to use
/dev/null in its place.

-G, –incremental
Handle old GNU-format incremental backups.

–ignore-failed-read
Do not exit with nonzero on unreadable files.

–level=NUMBER
Set dump level for created listed-incremental archive.
Currently only –level=0 is meaningful: it instructs
tar to truncate the snapshot file before dumping,
thereby forcing a level 0 dump.

-n, –seek
Assume the archive is seekable. Normally tar
determines automatically whether the archive can be
seeked or not. This option is intended for use in
cases when such recognition fails. It takes effect
only if the archive is open for reading (e.g. with
–list or –extract options).

–no-check-device
Do not check device numbers when creating incremental
archives.

–no-seek
Assume the archive is not seekable.

–occurrence[=N]
Process only the Nth occurrence of each file in the
archive. This option is valid only when used with one
of the following subcommands: –delete, –diff,
–extract or –list and when a list of files is given
either on the command line or via the -T option. The
default N is 1.

–restrict
Disable the use of some potentially harmful options.

–sparse-version=MAJOR[.MINOR]
Set version of the sparse format to use (implies
–sparse). This option implies –sparse. Valid
argument values are 0.0, 0.1, and 1.0. For a detailed
discussion of sparse formats, refer to the GNU Tar
Manual, appendix D, “Sparse Formats”. Using info
reader, it can be accessed running the following
command: info tar ‘Sparse Formats’.

-S, –sparse
Handle sparse files efficiently. Some files in the
file system may have segments which were actually never
written (quite often these are database files created
by such systems as DBM). When given this option, tar
attempts to determine if the file is sparse prior to
archiving it, and if so, to reduce the resulting
archive size by not dumping empty parts of the file.

Overwrite control
These options control tar actions when extracting a file over
an existing copy on disk.

-k, –keep-old-files
Don’t replace existing files when extracting.

–keep-newer-files
Don’t replace existing files that are newer than their
archive copies.

–no-overwrite-dir
Preserve metadata of existing directories.

–one-top-level[=DIR]
Extract all files into DIR, or, if used without
argument, into a subdirectory named by the base name of
the archive (minus standard compression suffixes
recognizable by –auto-compress).

–overwrite
Overwrite existing files when extracting.

–overwrite-dir
Overwrite metadata of existing directories when
extracting (default).

–recursive-unlink
Recursively remove all files in the directory prior to
extracting it.

–remove-files
Remove files from disk after adding them to the
archive.

–skip-old-files
Don’t replace existing files when extracting, silently
skip over them.

-U, –unlink-first
Remove each file prior to extracting over it.

-W, –verify
Verify the archive after writing it.

Output stream selection
–ignore-command-error

Ignore subprocess exit codes.

–no-ignore-command-error
Treat non-zero exit codes of children as error
(default).

-O, –to-stdout
Extract files to standard output.

–to-command=COMMAND
Pipe extracted files to COMMAND. The argument is the
pathname of an external program, optionally with
command line arguments. The program will be invoked
and the contents of the file being extracted supplied
to it on its standard output. Additional data will be
supplied via the following environment variables:

TAR_FILETYPE
Type of the file. It is a single letter with the
following meaning:

f           Regular file
d           Directory
l           Symbolic link
h           Hard link
b           Block device
c           Character device

Currently only regular files are supported.

TAR_MODE
File mode, an octal number.

TAR_FILENAME
The name of the file.

TAR_REALNAME
Name of the file as stored in the archive.

TAR_UNAME
Name of the file owner.

TAR_GNAME
Name of the file owner group.

TAR_ATIME
Time of last access. It is a decimal number,
representing seconds since the Epoch. If the
archive provides times with nanosecond
precision, the nanoseconds are appended to the
timestamp after a decimal point.

TAR_MTIME
Time of last modification.

TAR_CTIME
Time of last status change.

TAR_SIZE
Size of the file.

TAR_UID
UID of the file owner.

TAR_GID
GID of the file owner.

Additionally, the following variables contain
information about tar operation mode and the archive
being processed:

TAR_VERSION
GNU tar version number.

TAR_ARCHIVE
The name of the archive tar is processing.

TAR_BLOCKING_FACTOR
Current blocking factor, i.e. number of 512-byte
blocks in a record.

TAR_VOLUME
Ordinal number of the volume tar is processing
(set if reading a multi-volume archive).

TAR_FORMAT
Format of the archive being processed. One of:
gnu, oldgnu, posix, ustar, v7. TAR_SUBCOMMAND A
short option (with a leading dash) describing
the operation tar is executing.

Handling of file attributes
–atime-preserve[=METHOD]
Preserve access times on dumped files, either by
restoring the times after reading (METHOD=replace, this
is the default) or by not setting the times in the
first place (METHOD=system)

–delay-directory-restore
Delay setting modification times and permissions of
extracted directories until the end of extraction. Use
this option when extracting from an archive which has
unusual member ordering.

–group=NAME
Force NAME as group for added files.

–mode=CHANGES
Force symbolic mode CHANGES for added files.

–mtime=DATE-OR-FILE
Set mtime for added files. DATE-OR-FILE is either a
date/time in almost arbitrary formate, or the name of
an existing file. In the latter case the mtime of that
file will be used.

-m, –touch
Don’t extract file modified time.

–no-delay-directory-restore
Cancel the effect of the prior
–delay-directory-restore option.

–no-same-owner
Extract files as yourself (default for ordinary users).

–no-same-permissions
Apply the user’s umask when extracting permissions from
the archive (default for ordinary users).

–numeric-owner
Always use numbers for user/group names.

–owner=NAME
Force NAME as owner for added files.

-p, –preserve-permissions, –same-permissions
extract information about file permissions (default for
superuser)

–preserve
Same as both -p and -s.

–same-owner
Try extracting files with the same ownership as exists
in the archive (default for superuser).

-s, –preserve-order, –same-order
Sort names to extract to match archive

–sort=ORDER
When creating an archive, sort directory entries
according to ORDER, which is one of none, name, or
inode.

The default is –sort=none, which stores archive
members in the same order as returned by the operating
system.

Using –sort=name ensures the member ordering in the
created archive is uniform and reproducible.

Using –sort=inode reduces the number of disk seeks
made when creating the archive and thus can
considerably speed up archivation. This sorting order
is supported only if the underlying system provides the
necessary information.

Device selection and switching
-f, –file=ARCHIVE
Use archive file or device ARCHIVE. If this option is
not given, tar will first examine the environment
variable `TAPE’. If it is set, its value will be used
as the archive name. Otherwise, tar will assume the
compiled-in default. The default value can be
inspected either using the –show-defaults option, or
at the end of the tar –help output.

An archive name that has a colon in it specifies a file
or device on a remote machine. The part before the
colon is taken as the machine name or IP address, and
the part after it as the file or device pathname, e.g.:

–file=remotehost:/dev/sr0

An optional username can be prefixed to the hostname,
placing a @ sign between them.

By default, the remote host is accessed via the rsh(1)
command. Nowadays it is common to use ssh(1) instead.
You can do so by giving the following command line
option:

–rsh-command=/usr/bin/ssh

The remote machine should have the rmt(8) command
installed. If its pathname does not match tar’s
default, you can inform tar about the correct pathname
using the –rmt-command option.

–force-local
Archive file is local even if it has a colon.

-F, –info-script=COMMAND, –new-volume-script=COMMAND
Run COMMAND at the end of each tape (implies -M). The
command can include arguments. When started, it will
inherit tar’s environment plus the following variables:

TAR_VERSION
GNU tar version number.

TAR_ARCHIVE
The name of the archive tar is processing.

TAR_BLOCKING_FACTOR
Current blocking factor, i.e. number of 512-byte
blocks in a record.

TAR_VOLUME
Ordinal number of the volume tar is processing
(set if reading a multi-volume archive).

TAR_FORMAT
Format of the archive being processed. One of:
gnu, oldgnu, posix, ustar, v7.

TAR_SUBCOMMAND
A short option (with a leading dash) describing
the operation tar is executing.

TAR_FD File descriptor which can be used to communicate
the new volume name to tar.

If the info script fails, tar exits; otherwise, it
begins writing the next volume.

-L, –tape-length=
Change tape after writing Nx1024 bytes. If N is fol‐
lowed by a size suffix (see the subsection Size suf‐
fixes below), the suffix specifies the multiplicative
factor to be used instead of 1024.

This option implies -M.

-M, –multi-volume
Create/list/extract multi-volume archive.

–rmt-command=COMMAND
Use COMMAND instead of rmt when accessing remote ar‐
chives. See the description of the -f option, above.

–rsh-command=COMMAND
Use COMMAND instead of rsh when accessing remote ar‐
chives. See the description of the -f option, above.

–volno-file=FILE
When this option is used in conjunction with
–multi-volume, tar will keep track of which volume of
a multi-volume archive it is working in FILE.

Device blocking
-b, –blocking-factor=BLOCKS
Set record size to BLOCKSx512 bytes.

-B, –read-full-records
When listing or extracting, accept incomplete input
records after end-of-file marker.

-i, –ignore-zeros
Ignore zeroed blocks in archive. Normally two consecu‐
tive 512-blocks filled with zeroes mean EOF and tar
stops reading after encountering them. This option
instructs it to read further and is useful when reading
archives created with the -A option.

–record-size=NUMBER
Set record size. NUMBER is the number of bytes per
record. It must be multiple of 512. It can can be
suffixed with a size suffix, e.g. –record-size=10K,
for 10 Kilobytes. See the subsection Size suffixes,
for a list of valid suffixes.

Archive format selection
-H, –format=FORMAT
Create archive of the given format. Valid formats are:

gnu GNU tar 1.13.x format

oldgnu GNU format as per tar <= 1.12.

pax, posix
POSIX 1003.1-2001 (pax) format.

ustar POSIX 1003.1-1988 (ustar) format.

v7 Old V7 tar format.

–old-archive, –portability
Same as –format=v7.

–pax-option=keyword[[:]=value][,keyword[[:]=value]]…
Control pax keywords when creating PAX archives (-H
pax). This option is equivalent to the -o option of
the pax(1)utility.

–posix
Same as –format=posix.

-V, –label=TEXT
Create archive with volume name TEXT. If listing or
extracting, use TEXT as a globbing pattern for volume
name.

Compression options
-a, –auto-compress
Use archive suffix to determine the compression pro‐
gram.

-I, –use-compress-program=COMMAND
Filter data through COMMAND. It must accept the -d
option, for decompression. The argument can contain
command line options.

-j, –bzip2
Filter the archive through bzip2(1).

-J, –xz
Filter the archive through xz(1).

–lzip Filter the archive through lzip(1).

–lzma Filter the archive through lzma(1).

–lzop Filter the archive through lzop(1).

–no-auto-compress
Do not use archive suffix to determine the compression
program.

-z, –gzip, –gunzip, –ungzip
Filter the archive through gzip(1).

-Z, –compress, –uncompress
Filter the archive through compress(1).

Local file selection
–add-file=FILE
Add FILE to the archive (useful if its name starts with
a dash).

–backup[=CONTROL]
Backup before removal. The CONTROL argument, if sup‐
plied, controls the backup policy. Its valid values
are:

none, off
Never make backups.

t, numbered
Make numbered backups.

nil, existing
Make numbered backups if numbered backups exist,
simple backups otherwise.

never, simple
Always make simple backups

If CONTROL is not given, the value is taken from the
VERSION_CONTROL environment variable. If it is not
set, existing is assumed.

-C, –directory=DIR
Change to directory DIR.

–exclude=PATTERN
Exclude files matching PATTERN, a glob(3)-style wild‐
card pattern.

–exclude-backups
Exclude backup and lock files.

–exclude-caches
Exclude contents of directories containing file
CACHEDIR.TAG, except for the tag file itself.

–exclude-caches-all
Exclude directories containing file CACHEDIR.TAG and
the file itself.

–exclude-caches-under
Exclude everything under directories containing
CACHEDIR.TAG

–exclude-ignore=FILE
Before dumping a directory, see if it contains FILE.
If so, read exclusion patterns from this file. The
patterns affect only the directory itself.

–exclude-ignore-recursive=FILE
Same as –exclude-ignore, except that patterns from
FILE affect both the directory and all its subdirecto‐
ries.

–exclude-tag=FILE
Exclude contents of directories containing FILE, except
for FILE itself.

–exclude-tag-all=FILE
Exclude directories containing FILE.

–exclude-tag-under=FILE
Exclude everything under directories containing FILE.

–exclude-vcs
Exclude version control system directories.

–exclude-vcs-ignores
Exclude files that match patterns read from VCS-spe‐
cific ignore files. Supported files are: .cvsignore,
.gitignore, .bzrignore, and .hgignore.

-h, –dereference
Follow symlinks; archive and dump the files they point
to.

–hard-dereference
Follow hard links; archive and dump the files they
refer to.

-K, –starting-file=MEMBER
Begin at the given member in the archive.

–newer-mtime=DATE
Work on files whose data changed after the DATE. If
DATE starts with / or . it is taken to be a file name;
the mtime of that file is used as the date.

–no-null
Disable the effect of the previous –null option.

–no-recursion
Avoid descending automatically in directories.

–no-unquote
Do not unquote input file or member names.

–null Instruct subsequent -T options to read null-terminated
names, disable handling of the -C option read from the
file.

-N, –newer=DATE, –after-date=DATE
Only store files newer than DATE. If DATE starts with
/ or . it is taken to be a file name; the ctime of that
file is used as the date.

–one-file-system
Stay in local file system when creating archive.

-P, –absolute-names
Don’t strip leading slashes from file names when creat‐
ing archives.

–recursion
Recurse into directories (default).

–suffix=STRING
Backup before removal, override usual suffix. Default
suffix is ~, unless overridden by environment variable
SIMPLE_BACKUP_SUFFIX.

-T, –files-from=FILE
Get names to extract or create from FILE.

–unquote
Unquote file or member names (default).

-X, –exclude-from=FILE
Exclude files matching patterns listed in FILE.

File name transformations
–strip-components=NUMBER
Strip NUMBER leading components from file names on
extraction.

–transform=EXPRESSION, –xform=EXPRESSION
Use sed replace EXPRESSION to transform file names.

File name matching options
These options affect both exclude and include patterns.

–anchored
Patterns match file name start.

–ignore-case
Ignore case.

–no-anchored
Patterns match after any / (default for exclusion).

–no-ignore-case
Case sensitive matching (default).

–no-wildcards
Verbatim string matching.

–no-wildcards-match-slash
Wildcards do not match /.

–wildcards
Use wildcards (default for exclusion).

–wildcards-match-slash
Wildcards match / (default for exclusion).

Informative output
–checkpoint[=N]
Display progress messages every Nth record (default
10).

–checkpoint-action=ACTION
Run ACTION on each checkpoint.

–full-time
Print file time to its full resolution.

–index-file=FILE
Send verbose output to FILE.

-l, –check-links
Print a message if not all links are dumped.

–no-quote-chars=STRING
Disable quoting for characters from STRING.

–quote-chars=STRING
Additionally quote characters from STRING.

–quoting-style=STYLE
Set quoting style for file and member names. Valid
values for STYLE are literal, shell, shell-always, c,
c-maybe, escape, locale, clocale.

-R, –block-number
Show block number within archive with each message.

–show-omitted-dirs
When listing or extracting, list each directory that
does not match search criteria.

–show-transformed-names, –show-stored-names
Show file or archive names after transformation by
–strip and –transform options.

–totals[=SIGNAL]
Print total bytes after processing the archive. If
SIGNAL is given, print total bytes when this signal is
delivered. Allowed signals are: SIGHUP, SIGQUIT, SIG‐
INT, SIGUSR1, and SIGUSR2. The SIG prefix can be omit‐
ted.

–utc Print file modification times in UTC.

-v, –verbose
Verbosely list files processed.

–warning=KEYWORD
Enable or disable warning messages identified by KEY‐
WORD. The messages are suppressed if KEYWORD is pre‐
fixed with no- and enabled otherwise.

Multiple –warning messages accumulate.

Keywords controlling general tar operation:

all Enable all warning messages. This is the
default.

none Disable all warning messages.

filename-with-nuls
“%s: file name read contains nul character”

alone-zero-block
“A lone zero block at %s”

Keywords applicable for tar –create:

cachedir
“%s: contains a cache directory tag %s; %s”

file-shrank
“%s: File shrank by %s bytes; padding with
zeros”

xdev “%s: file is on a different filesystem; not
dumped”

file-ignored
“%s: Unknown file type; file ignored”
“%s: socket ignored”
“%s: door ignored”

file-unchanged
“%s: file is unchanged; not dumped”

ignore-archive
“%s: file is the archive; not dumped”

file-removed
“%s: File removed before we read it”

file-changed
“%s: file changed as we read it”

Keywords applicable for tar –extract:

existing-file
“%s: skipping existing file”

timestamp
“%s: implausibly old time stamp %s”
“%s: time stamp %s is %s s in the future”

contiguous-cast
“Extracting contiguous files as regular files”

symlink-cast
“Attempting extraction of symbolic links as hard
links”

unknown-cast
“%s: Unknown file type ‘%c’, extracted as normal
file”

ignore-newer
“Current %s is newer or same age”

unknown-keyword
“Ignoring unknown extended header keyword ‘%s'”

decompress-program
Controls verbose description of failures occur‐
ring when trying to run alternative decompressor
programs. This warning is disabled by default
(unless –verbose is used). A common example of
what you can get when using this warning is:

$ tar –warning=decompress-program -x -f archive.Z
tar (child): cannot run compress: No such file or directory
tar (child): trying gzip

This means that tar first tried to decompress
archive.Z using compress, and, when that failed,
switched to gzip.

record-size
“Record size = %lu blocks”

Keywords controlling incremental extraction:

rename-directory
“%s: Directory has been renamed from %s”
“%s: Directory has been renamed”

new-directory
“%s: Directory is new”

xdev “%s: directory is on a different device: not
purging”

bad-dumpdir
“Malformed dumpdir: ‘X’ never used”

-w, –interactive, –confirmation
Ask for confirmation for every action.

Compatibility options
-o When creating, same as –old-archive. When extracting,
same as –no-same-owner.

Size suffixes
Suffix    Units                   Byte Equivalent
b         Blocks                  SIZE x 512
B         Kilobytes               SIZE x 1024
c         Bytes                   SIZE
G         Gigabytes               SIZE x 1024^3
K         Kilobytes               SIZE x 1024
k         Kilobytes               SIZE x 1024
M         Megabytes               SIZE x 1024^2
P         Petabytes               SIZE x 1024^5
T         Terabytes               SIZE x 1024^4
w         Words                   SIZE x 2

RETURN VALUE top

Tar exit code indicates whether it was able to successfully
perform the requested operation, and if not, what kind of
error occurred.

0 Successful termination.

1 Some files differ. If tar was invoked with the
–compare (–diff, -d) command line option, this means
that some files in the archive differ from their disk
counterparts. If tar was given one of the –create,
–append or –update options, this exit code means that
some files were changed while being archived and so the
resulting archive does not contain the exact copy of
the file set.

2 Fatal error. This means that some fatal, unrecoverable
error occurred.

If a subprocess that had been invoked by tar exited with a
nonzero exit code, tar itself exits with that code as well.
This can happen, for example, if a compression option (e.g.
-z) was used and the external compressor program failed.
Another example is rmt failure during backup to a remote
device.

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