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Full Discussion: Using variables for exclusion in tar
Top Forums Shell Programming and Scripting Using variables for exclusion in tar Post 302438068 by mij on Sunday 18th of July 2010 07:02:30 AM
Old 07-18-2010
Using variables for exclusion in tar
Hello.

I am writing a backup script which uses a function to create a tar archive for a specified directory. For some reason though I cannot get tar to exclude a specified path when passed as a variable. The problem does not seem to be with the command though as it works when entered in the script directly.

Here are the relevant portions of the script:

Code:
BUP_ROOT=$HOME/backup
bup_files () {
   cd $2
   [[ "$3" ]] && BUP_EXCLUDE="--exclude='$3'" || BUP_EXCLUDE=""
   tar $BUP_EXCLUDE -czf $BUP_ROOT/$1.tgz ./
}

bup_files name_of_archive /path/to/archive "download/*"

This works except the specified directory is not excluded. If I put an 'echo' in front of the tar command it shows the $BUP_EXCLUDE variable is being set and with what I would expect. e.g.

Code:
tar --exclude='download/*' -czf /home/username/backup/name_of_archive.tgz ./

Wondering if the use of putting the whole exclusion option in a variable was a problem, as a test I rewrote the command as

Code:
tar --exclude='$3' -czf $BUP_ROOT/$1.tgz ./

This did not make any different though. As a final test I put the exclusion directly in the tar command

Code:
tar --exclude='download/*' -czf $BUP_ROOT/$1.tgz ./

This worked, the archive was created with the required path excluded. This leads me to think there is some problem with the shell passing the variable correctly rather than with the tar command. The wildcard is supposed to be a literal for tar to do its own pattern matching, and by testing with echo in front of the tar command it does seem to be passed as one, there is no globbing. I have even tried putting quotes around the $BUP_EXCLUDE" variable in the tar command to see if that helps with no effect.

The shell is BASH version 3.00.15 and I have tried searching for a solution with no luck so I hope I am missing something obvious here.

Thanks,

Michael.
 

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LEARN ABOUT CENTOS

bf_tar

BF_TAR(1)						    Bogofilter Reference Manual 						 BF_TAR(1)

NAME

       bf_tar - shell script to write a tar file of a bogofilter directory to stdout

SYNOPSIS

       bf_tar [-r] [-R] bogofilter_directory

DESCRIPTION

       bf_tar bundles a bogofilter working directory in tar format and copies it to standard output (your console, or where you redirect it, see
       EXAMPLES below).

OPTIONS

       The -r option causes bf_tar to remove inactive log files after the archive has been written successfully. The default is to leave log
       files.

       The -R option causes bf_tar to remove inactive log files before the archive is written. This may reduce chances that the resulting archive
       is recoverable should it become damaged. The archive may be smaller though. The default is to leave log files.

EXIT STATUS

       The script exits with status code 0 if everything went well, and nonzero if it encountered trouble.

EXAMPLES

       o   bf_tar ~/.bogofilter > outfile.tar

	   Writes a standard .tar file containing the essential files from ~/.bogofilter to outfile.tar.

       o   bf_tar ~/.bogofilter | gzip -9 -c > outfile.tar.gz

	   Writes a gzipped .tar.gz file containing the essential files from ~/.bogofilter to outfile.tar.gz.

       o   bf_tar `pwd`/mydirectory > outfile.tar

	   Prepend $(pwd)/ or `pwd`/ if you want to specify an absolute path instead of a relative path.

NOTES

       This script is meant for use with Berkeley DB based bogofilter versions.

       This script requires a SUSv2 compliant pax utility.

       This script expects a SUSv2 compliant shell. Solaris systems should have the SUNWxcu4 package installed (when bogofilter is configured) so
       that /usr/xpg4/bin/sh can be used.

AUTHORS

       Matthias Andree

Bogofilter							    10/22/2012								 BF_TAR(1)
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