tar does not skip empty directories
 

i'm using tar to create an archive from a mounted share. the archive should only backup files that are newer than "time"

tar --create --gzip --file=/path/to/gzip/file --newer=/path/to/timestamp/file /path/to/files/needing/backup/

this works great because only the files that are newer than the timestamp file are backed up. HOWEVER, since tar searches through all the directories in /path/to/files/needing/backup/ it also backs up empty directories. the files older than --newer get skipped, but that the directories that contain those files get backed up, therefore creating empty directories.

so my basic question is, how do i tell tar not to archive empty directories?

lrt

Tar doesn't provide an obvious means of skipping empty directories.

But, you could embed your tar script in a shell script. Let the shell detect empty directories in the search path and skip to the next until a directory with files is found, then apply the tar script to the files in the directory.

A method can be using find in conjunction with the tar command. First create a file with a timestamp to compare
this will create an empty file (named reftime) with timestamp 01-Oct-2007 15:00. Then suppose you want to look for file newer than the above timestamp, and tar/gzip them
Here I used the short form for tar options. The -cnewer option to the find command looks for files whose canghe time is more recent than the one of /path/to/reftime file. However this will include empty directories if (and only if) a directory has a timestamp newer than reftime and the files inside it are older, but in general this is not a common situation. I hope this helps a little.

exactly what i was looking for. thank you colucix! (cool screename by the way).

lrt

there doesn't seem to be a --no-recursion option for xargs

Uh oh... sorry, I mispelled the command (forgotten tar). --no-recursion is a tar option

works like a charm thanks again

You're welcome! :)