[SleePyCode]

I used to be able to decompress tar files from command line with
gnutar -xzf /path/to/file

Now I seem to be getting an error about the command being missing.

I tried to build tar 1.18 from source with these commands

cd tar-1.18
./configure
make
sudo make install

But that didn't help at all, it still says "gnutar" and "tar" are missing.

Code:
-bash: tar: command not found
-bash: gnutar: command not found

Anybody have any ideas how I can fix this? Is it possible to pull this from the mac os x 10.4 install cds? Or what else can I do to get this back?
I can no longer decompress the backups I get from my cpanel, As the only way I could find to correctly decompress them is command line as stuffit doesn't like to do this correctly.

[reader50]

They're both in /usr/bin/ on my system. 10.4.10

That's not a folder you usually delete stuff from. Check to see if they are still there, or if any of the other commands in that folder "can't be found" either? If the commands are there, but don't work, then your unix prefs are damaged, omitting the /usr/bin/ folder from command searches.

If commands are missing from that folder, you likely had some disk damage, which got repaired on boot. Minus some files here and there. An archive & install would be best in that case, because there is no telling what other OS files could be missing.

[SleePyCode]

I don't think I would of deleted anything out of there. Especially since it would require Admin privileges to do this.
Not to happy about having to do archive and install as I do have many custom packages I have compiled and would need to redo.

I was able to download and compile bzip just fine and can get it to work. But tar seems to have an issue.
Any ideas if There is a way to remove tar completely? It may be possible some files are messed up and its not replacing them.

[reader50]

It's easy enough to send you tar and gnutar. But you haven't said if those commands are still present or not in /usr/bin/

[SleePyCode]

I didn't see them with a quick look. Neither did command line

[code]Mac-Os-X-Home:~ me$ cd /usr/bin
Mac-Os-X-Home:/usr/bin me$ ./tar
-bash: ./tar: No such file or directory
Mac-Os-X-Home:/usr/bin me$ ./gnutar
-bash: ./gnutar: No such file or directory[/quote]

[reader50]

Code:
cd /usr/bin
ls -al

This will give an orderly list to look through. There should be 600+ items in here. If only tar & gnutar are missing, we can send them. If there are substantially less than 600, then install to another partition or to a flashdrive. Then copy across from that folder on the fresh install, and repair permissions on your boot drive afterwards.

Also, is your system a PPC or Intel Mac?

[SleePyCode]

Finder shows 766 files, Do you really want me to post that much?
I think its only those two files that are missing.
I am using PPC.

Thanks for the help btw, I am still lost to why tar will not compile but getting it fixed one way or another.

[reader50]

I'm guessing you accidentally zipped up the missing commands, which by default removes the unzipped versions.

Check your PMs please.

[Chuckit]

I'm guessing the reason reinstalling gnutar from source didn't work is because it installed the executables into /usr/local/bin and that's not in your PATH. I'd try to get back the OS X native version anyway, though, because I think it handles metadata more gracefully.

[CharlesS]

Yeah, that's what I was thinking too. In that case, you could get them back where you want them by either adding /usr/local/bin to your PATH, or by just moving the new ones:

sudo mv /usr/local/bin/tar /usr/bin/tar

However, if you want the default OS X version of tar back, here comes the obligatory shameless plug: Pacifist can pull it off of the OS X install discs. Check out the link in my signature.

[SleePyCode]

Originally Posted by Chuckit 

I'm guessing the reason reinstalling gnutar from source didn't work is because it installed the executables into /usr/local/bin and that's not in your PATH. I'd try to get back the OS X native version anyway, though, because I think it handles metadata more gracefully.

Yes that is correct, I just checked.
The ones reader50 has sent me worked just fine. I was able to decompress my cpanel backups so I could update my test site on my computer (its over 2 weeks old and content changes every day so it was time to update it).

I will have to remember to check that next time. But a symlink would of worked as well if I had known about that