NAME

       Arch::Tarball - an interface to create and work with tarballs

SYNOPSIS

           use Arch::Tarball

           my $tarball = Arch::Tarball->new;
           my $pipe = $tarball->create(
               dir => '/path/to/subdir-to-pack',
               base_name => 'new-subdir-to-pack',
               pipe => 1,
           );

DESCRIPTION

       Arch::Tarball provides an object oriented interface to work with (create, examine or extract) standard
       gzipped tarballs.

       Note: As functionality is added only when needed, a lot of features are currently not implemented.

METHODS

       The following functions are available:

       new, create, extract, list.

       new %opts
           Creates a new Arch::Tarball object.

           The following parameters can be set via %opts:

           tar The name of the tar executable. Defaults to "tar".

           file
               The filename of the Tarball.

       create %opts
           Creates a new tarball (tar.gz) from a given directory structure.

           create understands the following options:

           dir (mandatory)
               Specifies  the  base  directory  for the tarball. The given directory and recursively its content
               will be added to the tarball. The directory's basename will be used as the  first  and  the  only
               subdirectory in the tarball.

           base_name
               Allow  the programmer to specify a different base directory name for the tarball content than the
               basename of dir. In this case, 'cp' process is launched to temporarily rename the last element of
               dir.

           pipe
               When set, create does not create a physical tarball but writes the tarballs content  to  a  newly
               created pipe. The pipe is returned by the create method.

           Note: Currently the pipe option is mandatory.

       extract %opts
           Extracts  the  tarball  to  a  given target directory, specified by dir option.  If dir option is not
           given, a temporary directory is created that will hold the extracted dirs/files.  This  directory  is
           returned.

           The file option specifies the tarball file name. It may be given in the constructor instead.

       list %opts (not implemented yet)
           Returns a list of files and directories in the tarball.

BUGS

       Most  functionality  is  currently not implemented. If you need part of the missing functionality, please
       contact the authors.

       Patches are greatly appreciated.

AUTHORS

       Mikhael Goikhman (migo@homemail.com--Perl-GPL/arch-perl--devel).

       Enno Cramer (uebergeek@web.de--2003/arch-perl--devel).

perl v5.20.2                                       2005-04-22                                 Arch::Tarball(3pm)