How to list files inside .tar archive?

[Kevin Millar]

Can someone please post the tar syntax that can be used to list the files inside of a .tar file without exracting the files? Thanks

[spex · Accepted solution]

Hi Kevin,

# tar tvf file.tar

PCS

[A. Clay Stephenson]

The man page will do this but it's quite simple:

tar vtf myfile.tar and because the list is send to stdout:

tar vtf myfile.tar > mylist
or
tar vtf myfile.tar | lp -dmyprinter

also work.

[Ivan Krastev]

tar -tvf file.tar

regards

[Geoff Wild]

tar -tvf somefile.tar

tar -tvf somefile.tar |grep "particular.file"

man tar for info

Rgds...Geoff

[Kevin Millar]

Thanks everyone!

[A. Clay Stephenson]

... and to make it more confusing tar is one of the few UNIX commands that doesn't adhere to the standards so that "tar -vtf myfile.tar" and "tar vtf myfile.tar". The "-" is optional as an argument prefix. This too is explained in the man page.

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Kevin,

tar -tvf

Even works to tape.

SEP

[Steven E. Protter]

Sorry about my late post there.

I hit submit, walked away and it bombed.

man tar will give you advanced options or the ability to pull one file out of archive.

Please zero point my posts.

SEP

[Kevin Millar]

Thanks for the quick responses all!