question about unix commands

foxele · 01-22-2005, 06:30 PM

Hello:

I have two questions about unix commands.

1. if I have a complete directory structure to send to someone. Which command is most suitable for the task. and how to do it?

2. If I have a number of picture files having the .gif extension. which command should I use to compress them?

thanks

jtshaw · 01-22-2005, 06:33 PM

I'd use tar to do both tasks.

tar -cjf <tarballname.tar.bz2> <directory-to-tar>

The j in -cjf compresses using bz2 compression. If you change it to z it will use gzip compression instead.

rtspitz · 01-22-2005, 06:43 PM

pack some folder:

Code:

tar -czvf file-to-send.tgz /path/somefolder/anotherfolder

this will tar and gzip all contents of the given path.

uncompress with:

Code:

tar -xzvf file-to-send.tgz

bigearsbilly · 01-24-2005, 04:44 AM

not sure if there's anything to gain from compressing a gif?
they already compresed:

here's an example, the gzipped file is larger

18654 Jan 24 10:41 demopic.gif.gz
18619 Jan 24 10:41 demopic.gif

slakmagik · 01-24-2005, 05:33 AM

That's overhead on a small file - if it's a lot of gifs, there's still some redundancy to be squoze out of 'em

so it should be smaller or, at worst, about the same. But yeah, gzipping isn't worth the time, cycles, and potential for error - might as well just tar 'em up.