[winddancer]

Hi all,

I've got a large directory and I want to tar it creating multi volume archives with incrementing numbers.

However my tar file is constantly overwritten. I am doing something wrong, but I don't know where to add the incrementing number. or howto...

this is my tar line:

tar -cf test_backup.tar -M -L 912000 /dir_to_tar/ -R -p

So how should it look like?

[LKBrwn_DBA]

Unless you want something more complex, the best would be to add the date to the file name:

tar -cf test_backup_`date +%Y%m%d`.tar /dir_to_tar/

PS: I removed bogus options.

[winddancer]

Originally Posted by LKBrwn_DBA

Unless you want something more complex, the best would be to add the date to the file name:

tar -cf test_backup_`date +%Y%m%d`.tar /dir_to_tar/

PS: I removed bogus options.

Thanks for the reply. The problem is: The dir I want to archive has about 3 gigs of content. The system is configured to allow files no larger than 1 gig. So I want to archive the whole directoy creating multi volume files from it.

Therefore I used -L 912000. But I need to add some kind of incrementing number else the archive will be overwritten again and again.

[LKBrwn_DBA]

OK, then use the 'split' command:

tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/|split -b 2000m - test_backup_`date +%Y%m%d`.tar.
#--Or just:
tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/|split -b 2000m - test_backup.tar.

[winddancer]

Originally Posted by LKBrwn_DBA

OK, then use the 'split' command:

tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/|split -b 2000m - test_backup_`date +%Y%m%d`.tar.
#--Or just:
tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/|split -b 2000m - test_backup.tar.

hmmm me dumb...

still ain't working...

there is no option called split and there is no option with b...

I only got the -M option for multi archive and the manual says:

-M
--multi-volume Create/list/extract multi-volume archive.
-n
--norecurse Don't recurse into subdirectories when creating.
--volno-file file File name with volume number to start with.


But I don't get it to work...

[LKBrwn_DBA]

split and -b are NOT options for tar, split is a separate command and -b is an option for split.

In the example I posted there is a "pipe" (|) between the tar and the split commands.

[winddancer]

Originally Posted by LKBrwn_DBA

split and -b are NOT options for tar, split is a separate command and -b is an option for split.

In the example I posted there is a "pipe" (|) between the tar and the split commands.

like I said... I am dumb.

anyways... the problem I have is: (which I have already noted)
The dir I want to archive has about 3 gigs of content. The system is configured to allow files no larger than 1 gig.

Since the archive gets larger than the 1 GB it simply won't work with split...

well, I'll have to call the support to remove this ridiculous file limit... otherwise it won't probably work...

Thanks anyway for your help!

[LKBrwn_DBA]

The "-b 2000m" option in split will create files not larger than 2000 Megabytes ( < 2 GIG)

Did you try this command?:

tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/ | split -b 2000m - test_backup.tar.

PS: To create files not larger than 1 Gig use -b 1000m option.

[winddancer]

Originally Posted by LKBrwn_DBA

The "-b 2000m" option in split will create files not larger than 2000 Megabytes ( < 2 GIG)

Did you try this command?:

tar -cf - /dir_to_tar/ | split -b 2000m - test_backup.tar.

PS: To create files not larger than 1 Gig use -b 1000m option.

It worked!!!! thanks a lot! maybe i just misspelled something or so! Works like a charm now! Thanks again!

[winddancer]

just for the dumb me... how do I extract those multi volume archives?

I tried: tar -xfm volume.tar.aa

But well... it didn't work again... :/