Piping in and out of tar and gzip
Solution 1
tar
expects to be given a list of filenames as command line arguments. So far as I know, it cannot be used to read an anonymous pipeline (what would it store as filename and file-metadata?)
$ echo aaa | tar cv > f.tar
tar: Cowardly refusing to create an empty archive
Try `tar --help' for more information.
If your data is a single logical item or stream, there is no need to use something like tar, which is used to group together a set of separate files.
Otherwise you will have to write the data to a file first, tar the file, then delete the file.
Solution 2
The -f
option specifies a file, else the output goes to stdout. So, either drop the redirection:
zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 | tar czvf ~/backups/20070607.tar.gz
Or drop the f
option:
zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 | tar czv > ~/backups/20070607.tar.gz
Similarly with untarring.
ianc1215
Updated on September 18, 2022Comments
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ianc1215 over 1 year
I am trying to get a handle on how to pipe from a command into something like gzip, cpio or tar.
The commands in question belong to the ZFS system. I am running ZFS on Ubuntu Linux 10.04.3.
The commands I working with are;
To create a snapshot; zfs snapshot media/mypictures@20070607 To copy the snapshot to a directory; zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 > ~/backups/20070607 Then I can also pipe into gzip zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 | gzip > ~/backups/20070607.gz
These parts I understand.
But my first question is, what would I do to pipe into tar + gzip?
This?
zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 | tar czvf > ~/backups/20070607.tar.gz
And my other question is how would I get the data out of the tarball or gzip?
I have to use
zfs recieve media/mypictures@20070607 < ~/backups/20070607
So would it just be this if I was using tar?
zfs recieve media/mypictures@20070607 | tar xzvf < ~/backups/20070607.tar.gz
Any idea?
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ianc1215 over 12 yearsReally? I though tar was just another form of compression. So skip tar and just gzip?
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user5249203 over 12 yearsYes, just use
zfs send media/mypictures@20070607 | gzip -c > ~/backups/20070607.gz
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drevicko over 8 yearsTar DOES NOT expect a list of file names unless you specify the
-f
option (tar also acceptsf
without the "-"). -
user5249203 over 8 years@drevicko: The context of the question is creating a tar archive. The list of files I mean is the list of files (and/or directories) to be included in the written archive. For example:
cd /etc; TAPE=/tmp/rgb.tar tar c hosts passwd
where the list of files ishosts passwd
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drevicko over 8 years@RedGrittyBrick but the context of the question is to tar from a pipe, ie: no list of files. Saying tar expects a list of files is not true. The problem is that it expects a (single) output file name when the OP specifies
f
, and he didn't provide it. -
425nesp over 4 yearsDoes this actually work? Both
echo "hello" | tar czvf foo.tar.gz
andecho "hello" | tar czv > foo.tar.gz
fail for me.