Learn how the tar command can help you create and manage backups smartly and easily in this quick, informative tutorial.
Ever try something, it didn’t work, and you didn’t make a backup first?
One of the key rules for working as a system administrator is always to make a backup. You never know when you might need it. In my personal experience, it has saved me more times than I can count. It’s a common practice to complete and sometimes makes a difference in your finished work.
The tar utility has a ton of options and available usage. Tar stands for tape archive and allows you to create backups using: tar, gzip, and bzip. It compresses files and directories into an archive file, known as a tarball. This command is one of the most widely-used commands for this purpose. Also, the tarball is easily movable from one server to the next.
