I try to create an archive with tar using relative paths. I use the following command:
tar czf ~/files/wp/my-page-order.tar.gz -C ~/webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins/ ~/webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins/my-page-order
But the archived files still have absolute paths. How can I use tar with relative paths?
Answers:
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Method 1
~ is expanded by the shell. Don’t use ~ with -C:
tar czf ~/files/wp/my-page-order.tar.gz
-C ~
webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins/my-page-order
(tar will include webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins/my-page-order path)
or
tar czf ~/files/wp/my-page-order.tar.gz
-C ~/webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins
my-page-order
(tar will include my-page-order path)
Or just cd first….
cd ~/webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins tar czf ~/files/wp/my-page-order.tar.gz my-page-order
Method 2
-C new_cwd changes the current working directory to new_cwd. The following arguments are then evaluated relative to new_cwd.
Example:
tar czf ~/files/wp/my-page-order.tar.gz -C ~/webapps/zers/wp-content/plugins/ my-page-order
Method 3
The non GNU solution if tar has no -z option, just to mention:
pushd ~/files/wp; tar cvf - my-page-order | gzip > my-page-order.tar.gz && rm -rf my-page-order; popd
EDIT (with && and without rm):
pushd ~/files/wp && tar cvf - my-page-order | gzip > my-page-order.tar.gz && popd
Method 4
I tried with wildcard * but it gave me absolute paths as well so I tried later like this:
tar -czf ~/clientkeys.tgz -C /etc/openvpn/client/ .
This archives (compresses) all the given files without absolute paths.
It appears that with the dot (.) works well. Don’t know why exactly.
I hope the answer helps.
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