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Bzip2 Howto: Using bzip2 with tar

4. Using bzip2 with tar

Listed below are three ways to use bzip2 with tar, namely

4.1 Easiest to set up:

This method requires no setup at all. To un-tar the bzip2'd tar archive, foo.tar.bz2 in the current directory, do


/path/to/bzip2 -cd foo.tar.bz2 | tar xf -

This works, but can be a PITA to type often.

4.2 Easy to set up, fairly easy to use, no need for root privileges:

Thanks to for the tip. Thanks also to for differentiating bash from the csh's.

In your .bashrc, you can put in a line like this:


alias btar='tar --use-compress-program /usr/local/bin/bzip2 '

In your .tcshrc, or .cshrc, the analogous line looks like this:


alias btar 'tar --use-compress-program /usr/local/bin/bzip2'

4.3 Also easy to use, but needs root access.

Apply the patch below to gnu tar 1.12 as follows:


cd tar-1.12/src; patch < /path/to/tar.diff

compile it, and install it, and you're good to go. Make sure that both tar and bzip2 are in your $PATH by "which tar" and "which bzip2." To use the new tar, just do


 tar xyf foo.tar.bz2

to decompress the file.

To make a new archive, it's similar:


 tar cyf foo.tar.bz2 file1 file2 file3...directory1 directory2...

Here is the patch:

*** tar.c       Thu Jun 11 00:09:23 1998
--- tar.c.new   Thu Jun 11 00:14:24 1998
***************
*** 196,201 ****
--- 196,203 ----
    {"block-number", no_argument, NULL, 'R'},
    {"block-size", required_argument, NULL, OBSOLETE_BLOCKING_FACTOR},
    {"blocking-factor", required_argument, NULL, 'b'},
+   {"bzip2", required_argument, NULL, 'y'},
+   {"bunzip2", required_argument, NULL, 'y'},
    {"catenate", no_argument, NULL, 'A'},
    {"checkpoint", no_argument, _option, 1},
    {"compare", no_argument, NULL, 'd'},
***************
*** 372,377 ****
--- 374,380 ----
                PATTERN                at list/extract time, a globbing PATTERN\n\
    -o, --old-archive, --portability   write a V7 format archive\n\
        --posix                        write a POSIX conformant archive\n\
+   -y, --bzip2, --bunzip2             filter the archive through bzip2\n\
    -z, --gzip, --ungzip               filter the archive through gzip\n\
    -Z, --compress, --uncompress       filter the archive through compress\n\
        --use-compress-program=PROG    filter through PROG (must accept -d)\n"),
***************
*** 448,454 ****
     Y  per-block gzip compression */
  
  #define OPTION_STRING \
!   "-01234567ABC:F:GK:L:MN:OPRST:UV:WX:Zb:cdf:g:hiklmoprstuvwxz"
  
  static void
  set_subcommand_option (enum subcommand subcommand)
--- 451,457 ----
     Y  per-block gzip compression */
  
  #define OPTION_STRING \
!   "-01234567ABC:F:GK:L:MN:OPRST:UV:WX:Zb:cdf:g:hiklmoprstuvwxyz"
  
  static void
  set_subcommand_option (enum subcommand subcommand)
***************
*** 805,810 ****
--- 808,817 ----
        case 'X':
        exclude_option = 1;
        add_exclude_file (optarg);
+       break;
+ 
+       case 'y':
+       set_use_compress_program_option ("bzip2");
        break;
  
        case 'z':


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