Re: [Bug-tar] "GNU tar zxvf foo.tar.bz2" doesn't work

[Dabe Murphy]

http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-tar/2007-03/msg00047.html

Sergey Poznyakoff writes:
> Michael Bacarella <address@hidden> wrote:
>
> >/ $ tar zxvf mp3act_12.tar.bz2/
> >/ /
> >/ gzip: stdin: not in gzip format/
> >/ tar: Child returned status 1/
> >/ tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors/
> >/ /
> >/ /
> >/ Why does the user need to know if it's packed with bzip2 or gzip or 
> compress?/
>
> He does not. Do not use any compression option for tar to autodetect the
> format:
>
>   tar xvf mp3act_12.tar.bz2

Please please *PLEASE* make "z" or "j" Do What I Mean!  (Feel free to 
print a warning to stderr, but for f*ck's sake, imagine how much 
confusion and frustration would be eliminated...)

Michael (the OP) was absolutely correct:
> Option z, j, Z should be synonyms for "the tar is inside a compressed
> file, figure out what it is and invoke the correct de-compression
> program for me because this is THE FUTURE and COMPUTERS ARE SMART".
>   

Amen, brother!  Even if those options are simply ignored on extraction, 
some of us have fifteen years of Unix muscle memory built into our 
fingers; PLEASE make our lives simpler...

--
:- Dabe

--
:- Dabrien "Dabe" Murphy
:- Sr. Systems Administrator
:- Parabon Computation, Inc.
:- Frontier® Grid Support Operations Center
--
:- www.GlobalGridExchange.com
:- "Expanding the Market for Grid Computation"
--
:- Email: address@hidden
:- Phone: (703) 689-9689 ext. 202