.TH TAR2SQFS "1" "June 2019" "tar2sqfs" "User Commands"
.SH NAME
tar2sqfs \- create a squashfs image from a tar archive
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B tar2sqfs
[\fI\,OPTIONS\/\fR...] \fI\,<sqfsfile>\/\fR
.SH DESCRIPTION
Read an uncompressed tar archive from stdin and turn it into a squashfs
filesystem image.

The idea is to quickly and painlessly turn a tar ball into a squashfs
filesystem image, so existing tools that work with tar can be used for
squashfs.
.PP
Possible options:
.TP
\fB\-\-compressor\fR, \fB\-c\fR <name>
Select the compressor to use.
Run \fBtar2sqfs \-\-help\fR to get a list of all available compressors
and the default selection.
.TP
\fB\-\-comp\-extra\fR, \fB\-X\fR <options>
A comma seperated list of extra options for the selected compressor. Specify
\fBhelp\fR to get a list of available options.
.TP
\fB\-\-block\-size\fR, \fB\-b\fR <size>
Block size to use for Squashfs image.
Defaults to 131072.
.TP
\fB\-\-dev\-block\-size\fR, \fB\-B\fR <size>
Device block size to padd the image to.
Defaults to 4096.
.TP
\fB\-\-defaults\fR, \fB\-d\fR <options>
A comma seperated list of default values for
implicitly created directories.
The following values can be set:
.TS
tab(;) allbox;
l l
l l
l l
l l
l l
rd.
\fBOption\fR;\fBDefault\fR
uid=<value>;0
gid=<value>;0
mode=<value>;0755
mtime=<value>;0
.TE
.TP
.TP
\fB\-\-force\fR, \fB\-f\fR
Overwrite the output file if it exists.
.TP
\fB\-\-quiet\fR, \fB\-q\fR
Do not print out progress reports.
.TP
\fB\-\-help\fR, \fB\-h\fR
Print help text and exit.
.TP
\fB\-\-version\fR, \fB\-V\fR
Print version information and exit.
.SH LIMITATIONS
Currently the tool can only process POSIX tar archives with pax extensions, so
you need to tell your tool that generates the tar ball to not use any other
extensions.

For GNU tar, this can be done with the flag \fB\-\-posix\fR:
.IP
tar cf file.tar \-\-posix bin/ lib/ etc/ usr/
.TP
Furthermore, hard links and sparse files are currently not supported. If any
unsupported section is encountered in a tar archive, the section is skipped and
a warning message is written to stderr.
.SH EXAMPLES
.TP
Turn an uncompressed tar archive into a squashfs image:
.IP
tar2sqfs rootfs.sqfs < rootfs.tar
.TP
Turn a gzip'ed tar archive into a squashfs image:
.IP
zcat rootfs.tar.gz | tar2sqfs rootfs.sqfs
.TP
Turn an LZMA2 compressed tar archive into a squashfs image:
.IP
xzcat rootfs.tar.xz | tar2sqfs rootfs.sqfs
.SH AUTHOR
Written by David Oberhollenzer.
.SH COPYRIGHT
Copyright \(co 2019 David Oberhollenzer
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
.br
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.