UNIX for Beginners Questions & Answers

and how would it be used?

to start with...
tar cvf bulkArchive.tar expla*.gz

I can not find a solution to this problem

Why is the suggestion posted by vgersh99 in post #9 in this thread not a solution to this problem?

There isn't one because gzip does not work that way.

We are not being obtuse or blocking you -- gzip doesn't work that way. gzip holds one and only one filename.

This may be counterintuitive but is completely normal for UNIX, where archiver and compressor are different programs. The usual way to pack multiple files into a gzip is to create a tar file, then gzip the tar file. This is the normal UNIX way to create an archive. tar is a standard UNIX command and file format which you now have instructions for using.

Why are you so deadset on using gzip by itself? What are your requirements?

I am not convinced, I am ignorant in this problem so I ask for your help, as requested I am asked to use the gzip, I thought it could.

I am sorry that you don't believe us.

Have you looked at the man page for gzip? Does the man page for the version of gzip you are using say anything about it being able to zip multiple files into a single archive (other than by zipping an archive containing multiple files?

You are, of course, free to build your own utility similar to gzip that might be able to do what you want, but the resulting archive would not be able to be unzipped by any existing gunzip utilities to restore your original files in one step.

The file format used by gzip when creating a file with the .gz suffix contains information describing the data needed to decompress the data in that file. It does not contain a table of contents needed to enable it to contain multiple compressed files.

Creating additional threads is not going to solve your problem!