> cpio ?
>
> It does the job of both tar and gzip. Try an :-
>
> info cpio
I am familiar with cpio, but as I said, I was hoping for a format that
does not contain usernames and other metainformation that is not
necessary for software distribution. I believe cpio is meant for
backups is it not? I don't believe a format meant for backups is a
great thing to use for software distribution.
> As for the Linux Kernel archives, I do not really think there is enough
> justification for a change in distribution format.
Right, well I did take the thread my own way, and am posing this as a
more general question on software distribution. Certainly I don't know
of another format at this point that would be a better way to distribute
it, and the original poster's concerns probably don't have a major
impact on most people.
> Most kernel coders either use non root account for untar'ing and making
> the kernel and do a 'sudo make install' anyway.
Well, the whole idea that having to use a non-root account to unpack
some files has always been rediculous to me. Sure, given the way tar
behaves, it is insane not to, but for a software distribution tool,
making this a requirement is pretty lame. Changing tar's behavior to be
safer is possible, but would likely degrade the ability of tar to be a
good backup tool. The use cases for each type of tool are simply
different.
thanks for your response,
tim
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Received on Sep 20 2006
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