cli-tarHow do I use the tar command in a shell script?

The tar command is a useful tool for creating and manipulating archives of files in the Linux/Unix shell. It can be used in a shell script to quickly and easily create archives, extract files, and perform other tasks related to archiving.

Here is an example of a shell script that uses the tar command to create an archive of a directory:

#!/bin/bash

# Create an archive of the directory
tar -cvf my_archive.tar my_directory

# List the contents of the archive
tar -tvf my_archive.tar

The output of this script would look something like this:

-rw-r--r-- user/user 0 2020-07-20 18:20 my_directory/file1.txt
-rw-r--r-- user/user 0 2020-07-20 18:21 my_directory/file2.txt

The script uses the following options:

• -c: Create an archive
• -v: Verbose output (list the contents of the archive)
• -f: Specify the filename of the archive

For more information on the tar command and its various options, please refer to the GNU tar manual.

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