PATOOL(1)               General Commands Manual              PATOOL(1)



NAME
       patool - portable archive file manager

SYNOPSIS
        patool         [global-options]        (list|test|extract|cre‐
       ate|diff|search|repack|recompressfP|formats)  [command-options]
       <command-arguments>...

DESCRIPTION
       Various  archive  formats  can  be  created, extracted, tested,
       listed,  searched,  repacked,  recompressed  and  compared   by
       patool.  The  advantage of patool is its simplicity in handling
       archive files without having to remember a myriad  of  programs
       and options.

       The  archive format is determined by the file(1) program and as
       a fallback by the archive file extension.

       patool supports 7z (.7z), ACE (.ace), ADF (.adf), ALZIP (.alz),
       APE  (.ape), AR (.a), ARC (.arc), ARJ (.arj), BZIP2 (.bz2), CAB
       (.cab), COMPRESS (.Z), CPIO (.cpio), DEB  (.deb),  DMS  (.dms),
       FLAC  (.flac), GZIP (.gz), ISO (.iso), LRZIP (.lrz), LZH (.lha,
       .lzh), LZIP (.lz), LZMA (.lzma), LZOP (.lzo), RPM  (.rpm),  RAR
       (.rar),  RZIP  (.rz),  SHN  (.shn),  TAR  (.tar), XZ (.xz), ZIP
       (.zip, .jar), ZOO (.zoo) and ZPAQ (.zpaq) formats.   It  relies
       on  helper  applications  to  handle those archive formats (for
       example bzip2 for BZIP2 archives).

       The archive formats TAR, ZIP,  BZIP2  and  GZIP  are  supported
       natively   and   do  not  require  helper  applications  to  be
       installed.

EXAMPLES
         patool extract archive.zip otherarchive.rar
         patool --verbose test dist.tar.gz
         patool list package.deb
         patool --verbose create myfiles.zip file1.txt dir/
         patool diff release1.0.tar.xz release2.0.zip
         patool search "def urlopen" python-3.3.tar.gz
         patool repack linux-2.6.33.tar.gz linux-2.6.33.tar.bz2
         patool recompress images.zip

GLOBAL OPTIONS
       -v, --verbose
              Display more info about what patool  does,  and  display
              the output of helper applications. Can be given multiple
              times to increase the output even more.

       --non-interactive
              Try to prevent any interactive user input (ie. prompting
              for  passwords  or for overwriting duplicate files). Use
              this option with care since overwriting files or  ignor‐
              ing  password  prompts  could  lead to unintended conse‐
              quences.
              This only works for programs that allow preventing  user
              prompts. Currently those are arj, 7z and rar.

COMMANDS
       The following rules apply to all commands:

       ·   Existing files are never overwritten.

       ·   The original archive will never be removed.

       ·   Files  outside  the output directory will never be created.
           This relies on archive program options to prevent unpacking
           of  files  with  an  absolute  path  name  (eg.  --no-abso‐
           lute-filenames for cpio(1)).

       The following commands are available.

   extract
       patool extract [--outdir directory] <archive>...

       Extract files from given archives. The original  archives  will
       never be removed and are left as is.

       --outdir directory
              Extract  to  the  given  output directory. Default is to
              extract to the current working directory.

       If the archive contains exactly one file or directory, the  ar‐
       chive  contents are extracted directly to the output directory.
       Else the files are extracted in a newly created subdirectory of
       the  output directory. The new directory is named after the ar‐
       chive filename without the extension.
       This prevents cluttering the output directory  with  a  lot  of
       files from the extracted archive.

       All  extracted  files are ensured that they are readable by the
       current user.

   list
       patool list <archive>...

       List files in archives.

   create
       patool create <archive> <file-or-directory>...

       Create an archive from given files. All of the given  files  to
       add  to  the archive must be readable by the current user.  The
       format of the archive to create is determined  by  the  archive
       file  extension. If the archive program has options to maximize
       file compression, patool uses those options.

   test
       patool test <archive>...

       Test the given archives. If the  helper  application  does  not
       support testing, the archive contents are listed instead.

   diff
       patool diff <archive1> <archive2>

       Show differences between two archives with the diff(1) program.
       The diff options used are -urN.

   search
       patool search <pattern> <archive>

       Search in archive contents for given pattern using the  grep(1)
       program.   The grep options used are -r; additional options can
       be supplied with the GREP_OPTIONS environment variable.

   repack
       patool repack <archive> <archive_new>

       Repackage archive to a different  format.  The  target  archive
       format is determined by the file extension of archive_new.

   recompress
       patool recompress <archive>

       Recompress  archive  to  a  smaller file size. If the resulting
       file is not smaller, the archive is left unchanged.

   formats
       patool formats

       Show all supported archive formats (ie. which  helper  applica‐
       tions are available).

HELP OPTION
       Specifying  the help option displays help for patool itself, or
       a command.
       For example:
         patool --help - display help for patool
         patool extract --help - display help for the extract command

SHELL ALIASES
       When running under a Unix shell the following  aliases  can  be
       defined to save some typing:
         alias pl='patool list'
         alias px='patool extract'
         alias pc='patool create'
         alias pd='patool diff'

AUTHOR
       Bastian Kleineidam <bastian.kleineidam@web.de>

COPYRIGHT
       Copyright © 2010-2015 Bastian Kleineidam



patool                         July 2013                     PATOOL(1)
