tar

A Nodejs utility for creating and extracting __tar__ archives programmatically.

Purpose

To be used programmatically for creating and extracting updates in tar format.

The created tar can be compressed or decompressed by the Nodejs zlib.

__tar__ create archive in POSIX 1003.1-1988 (ustar) format.

Goals

- to create and extracts __tar__ archives in __UStar__ format.
- to be compatible with __7-Zip__ and the Linux __tar__ command.
- to have an easy, eat all, API.
- to have a more detailed API for hacking.
- use relative paths from the parent of the 'target' directory

Examples

$3

Archive a complete directory to a tar archive.

Here target can be a path to a directory or a single file.

``

JavaScript

const {createArchive} = require("@popovmp/tar");



const tarPath = "stuff.tar";

const target  = "./path/to/stuff";



createArchive(tarPath, target);





$3



Extract a __tar__ archive from

tarPath into the destination

 directory.

JavaScript

const {extractArchive} = require("@popovmp/tar");



const tarPath     = "stuff.tar";

const destination = "./destination";



extractArchive(tarPath, destination);





$3



You can extract a __tar__ buffer to a destination directory.

This method is useful when you acquire the tar buffer from a network request.

JavaScript

const {extract} = require("@popovmp/tar");



const tarball     = getTarBufferSomehow();

const destination = "./destination";



extract(tarball, destination);





$3



Create a __tar__ Buffer given a list of entry paths and a base directory.



This is useful if you want to precise the tar content.

JavaScript

const {getEntryStats, create} = require("@popovmp/tar");

const {gzipSync} = require("node:zlib");



const baseDir    = "./base";

const entryPaths = [

	"stuff/",

	"stuff/hello.txt",

	"stuff/inner/",

	"stuff/inner/other.bin",

];



const entryStats = getEntryStats(baseDir, entryPaths);

const tarball    = create(baseDir, entryStats);

const tarGz      = gzipSync(tarball);



// Save tarGz to file or send it via network.





$3



Read all entry pats of a target directory.



It is useful if you want to manually add or remove paths to archive.

JavaScript

const {getEntryPaths} = require("@popovmp/tar");



const target     = "./path/to/stuff";

const entryPaths = getEntryPaths(target);



console.log(entryPaths.join("\n"));    



/* 

"stuff/"

"stuff/hello.txt"

"stuff/inner/"

"stuff/inner/other.bin"

*/

tar