NAME¶
virt-tar - Extract or upload files to a virtual machine
SYNOPSIS¶
virt-tar [--options] -x domname directory tarball
virt-tar [--options] -u domname tarball directory
virt-tar [--options] disk.img [disk.img ...] -x directory tarball
virt-tar [--options] disk.img [disk.img ...] -u tarball directory
OBSOLETE¶
This tool is obsolete. Use
virt-copy-in(1),
virt-copy-out(1),
virt-tar-in(1),
virt-tar-out(1) as replacements.
EXAMPLES¶
Download "/home" from the VM into a local tarball:
virt-tar -x domname /home home.tar
virt-tar -zx domname /home home.tar.gz
Upload a local tarball and unpack it inside "/tmp" in the VM:
virt-tar -u domname uploadstuff.tar /tmp
virt-tar -zu domname uploadstuff.tar.gz /tmp
WARNING¶
You must
not use "virt-tar" with the
-u option (upload)
on live virtual machines. If you do this, you risk disk corruption in the VM.
"virt-tar" tries to stop you from doing this, but doesn't catch all
cases.
You can use
-x (extract) on live virtual machines, but you might get
inconsistent results or errors if there is filesystem activity inside the VM.
If the live VM is synched and quiescent, then "virt-tar" will
usually work, but the only way to guarantee consistent results is if the
virtual machine is shut down.
DESCRIPTION¶
"virt-tar" is a general purpose archive tool for downloading and
uploading parts of a guest filesystem. There are many possibilities: making
backups, uploading data files, snooping on guest activity, fixing or
customizing guests, etc.
If you want to just view a single file, use
virt-cat(1). If you just want
to edit a single file, use
virt-edit(1). For more complex cases you
should look at the
guestfish(1) tool.
There are two modes of operation:
-x (eXtract) downloads a directory and
its contents (recursively) from the virtual machine into a local tarball.
-u uploads from a local tarball, unpacking it into a directory inside
the virtual machine. You cannot use these two options together.
In addition, you may need to use the
-z (gZip) option to enable
compression. When uploading, you have to specify
-z if the upload file
is compressed because virt-tar won't detect this on its own.
"virt-tar" can only handle tar (optionally gzipped) format tarballs.
For example it cannot do PKZip files or bzip2 compression. If you want that
then you'll have to rebuild the tarballs yourself. (This is a limitation of
the
libguestfs(3) API).
OPTIONS¶
- --help
- Display brief help.
- --version
- Display version number and exit.
- -c URI
- --connect URI
- If using libvirt, connect to the given URI. If
omitted, then we connect to the default libvirt hypervisor.
If you specify guest block devices directly, then libvirt is not used at
all.
- --format raw
- Specify the format of disk images given on the command
line. If this is omitted then the format is autodetected from the content
of the disk image.
If disk images are requested from libvirt, then this program asks libvirt
for this information. In this case, the value of the format parameter is
ignored.
If working with untrusted raw-format guest disk images, you should ensure
the format is always specified.
- -x
- --extract
- --download
- -u
- --upload
- Use -x to extract (download) a directory from a
virtual machine to a local tarball.
Use -u to upload and unpack from a local tarball into a virtual
machine. Please read the "WARNING" section above before using
this option.
You must specify exactly one of these options.
- -z
- --gzip
- Specify that the input or output tarball is
gzip-compressed.
SHELL QUOTING¶
Libvirt guest names can contain arbitrary characters, some of which have meaning
to the shell such as "#" and space. You may need to quote or escape
these characters on the command line. See the shell manual page
sh(1)
for details.
SEE ALSO¶
guestfs(3),
guestfish(1),
virt-cat(1),
virt-edit(1),
virt-copy-in(1),
virt-copy-out(1),
virt-tar-in(1),
virt-tar-out(1),
Sys::Guestfs(3),
Sys::Guestfs::Lib(3),
Sys::Virt(3), <
http://libguestfs.org/>.
AUTHOR¶
Richard W.M. Jones <
http://people.redhat.com/~rjones/>
COPYRIGHT¶
Copyright (C) 2009 Red Hat Inc.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR
A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with
this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin
Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA.